Return to Ered Luin
by Painton
Summary: After surviving their long and dangerous journey into the Mountains of Angmar and the Forodwaith, Fili, Kili and Betta return to Ered Luin. The brothers prepare for their quest to Erebor, but adventure has left its mark on them. What will Thorin say? And how will they hide from him the truth, that Fili has brought home not gold... but a wife! - Sequel to Quest to Forochel. Fili/OC
1. The Journey Home

**Well, you know what they say about sequels… **

**And yet, this is indeed the sequel to my previous story, Quest to Forochel. I will try to write it so that you don't _have_ to have read first one, but you really should go back and read the first one! I promise you, it's quite good. We'll wait :)**

**Back now? Okay, let's get started.**

**I ****own nothing that is Tolkien's. He is the master, and I am but a humble flatterer enamored of his works (and with Peter Jackson's interpretation of them, too). Betta is my own OC, and I have grown very fond of her, but this story is really about Fili and Kili, their preparations for the Quest to Erebor and their relationship with their grim uncle, Thorin...**

**Oh, who am I kidding! It's mostly lovely, romantic angst! I spent eighteen months on QtF, now it's time to have some FUN :D**

**If you like this story, leave a REVIEW! If you don't like it, leave a REVIEW anyway and tell me what I'm doing wrong. I love it!**

**-Paint**

* * *

Even in March, in the north of Forodwaith and as far south as the foothills of the Mountains of Angmar, the land lay under a bitter cold wind and huge drifts of deep snow, but south of the great Icebay of Forochel, the weather was growing mild and the snow was not deep. The high peaks of Ered Luin were a wall against the gentle winds of Belegaer, but they also collected the worst of the snow upon their peaks. The air was cold east of the mountains and in winter there was little traffic between the River Lhun and the icy beaches of Forochel, but a long and winding north-south road had been built far away from _the_ North-South Road. It was used mainly by the hearty ice-traders who were all of the race of Men. Many years had passed since the Dwarves went that way in any noticeable number. Gundabad and the Eastern Road through Angmar were too dangerous to allow the descendants of Durin to visit their ancestral home.

The road between the Lhun and Forochel was difficult, but the winter of 2941 had been mild (for those who had not ventured farther north than the North Downs) and spring was come early. The scent of the season was in the air, and the northern arm of the river that would normally have remained frozen well into April had begun to crack and thaw so that it was dangerous to attempt the crossing with any weight of wagons.

And it was many wagons that wound down from the north and passed through the few villages and about the even fewer homesteads built beside the road. Pale faces looked out of windows as they rode by and it was a curious sight they saw.

First in line were many grim and frowning Men dressed in heavy fur coats though their faces were still tanned by the sunny lands of the south from whence they had come. They drove five wagons piled high with seal skins, frozen slabs of whale meat and jars of fish oil fresh that they brought from the Lossoth villages of the north. At the last northern village, a company of ice-traders had joined the caravan, riding with them while the weather was cold, but as the air grew warmer, the ice-traders quickened their speed and rode swiftly on ahead. Theirs was a race against time to bring their precious cargo south to Mithlond before pure ice turned to cold water.

Last in line of the long caravan were six Dwarves upon ponies and three more that drove a single wagon nearly empty of all but rope and tent. These were the merchants of Gloin, son of Groin, and they had set out from Dunland many weeks before. Groin's son did not trade for goods but for gold, and each Dwarf carried a purse beneath his shirt that had grown heavier with every stop they had made along the way. All that their wagon had once carried had been changed and changed-over many times until even the little that Gloin had bought from the Lossoth was sold back to the Men of his own caravan in exchange for gold. Only his clever mind could have calculated the profit of the journey – though a profit had certainly been made – and yet there was no doubt among the Men that they had come out the worst for his work.

The goodwill between the two companies of the caravan had been lost upon the road. The Dwarves would have ridden apart from the Men either way, but once the extent of their loss had been made known, the Men had widened the space between them and neither word nor man bridged the gap but what was absolutely necessary.

Trapped there, within the no-man's-land that had been formed between the two races, rode not a man but a woman, a single pony and its rider. If the strangeness of the mixed-race caravan had not been enough to draw curious eyes, then surely she would have.

The woman was small and pale, her long dark hair hung in tangled locks and half-braids. Her coat was clearly not made in Eriador but belonged to a faraway land and its wear and tear proclaimed that it had seen better days many years ago. The woman rode well, but she sat stiffly in her saddle, her shoulders bowed down under a heavy weight and her right arm wrapped in a sling. She held close against her chest as if it gave her great pain. Even so, her eyes were stern and her jaw proudly set. She might have ridden alone for all the thought she seemed to give to the rest of the caravan; to any who saw her without knowing her tale, she seemed a lost wanderer who happened to turn onto the road between the Men and Dwarves without realizing they were one travelling party.

Betta knew that they were a single caravan, and that she was a begrudged part of it. She thought bitterly of the promise that Fili had made that she would ride along with him upon his pony to rest her injured arm. That promise had lasted only long enough for him to speak with his fellow Dwarves, for _they_ would not have a human among them. They were not like Fili and his brother.

She had been disappointed, but not surprised, on the day they set out, when she learned that she was expected to ride her old pony by herself. She was disappointed, but not surprised, to learn that Fili was unwilling to stand up to his fellow Dwarves and defend her.

Her pony's hoof struck a stone beneath the snow and stumbled. Betta's arm was jostled and she gasped at the sudden shock of pain that shot up to her shoulder and across her chest. It had been more than two weeks since the Lossoth healer had taken his bone-saw to her right forearm and cut away the mangled hand and wrist that had been crushed beneath the cold waters of Angmar's underground rivers, but she could still feel the tingling of the cold air against her invisible fingertips. She closed her eyes and imagined the missing hand rolled up tight into a fist to protect the fingers that were not there from the bitter wind. The phantoms chill faded and she sighed.

The first day of their ride had been the most difficult when her wound had been fresh and unused to being moved. She had struggled to learn how to change her own bandages, to wash the fresh scars with melted snow, and to endure the constant pain that was like a fire burning up her arm and down her back until half her body was numb. That first night had been a nightmare that she could not wake up from because she could not fall asleep. Every way that she lay hurt her, and she felt vulnerable without Fili or Kili sleeping at her back.

Four days it had taken to deaden the pain in her arm, and by then her anger had dulled as well. She no longer blamed Fili for forgetting her; she blamed herself instead for being foolish enough to think that nothing would change once he was back among his own kind.

The sound of muted voices reached her ears and she opened her eyes. She had ridden too close to the company of Men and they had begun to look back at her and to murmur angrily to themselves. Betta checked her pony. The animal was not happy. It did not like to ride alone when its fellows were near enough to smell. It whinnied in protest, but Betta knew that she was stuck were she was. She missed the ice-traders; they, at least, had spoken with her and told her all the news of the south. They were Men, but they traded with Elves, Dwarves and Men equally, and dealt with each race without prejudice or fear.

The other company of Men, those from Dunland and Bree who had come north with Gloin's Dwarves looked sideways at Betta and sneered at her. She had heard them talk, back at the Lossoth village, whispering behind their hands about her. She was a human who had spent too much time among Dwarves. Their scent was on her and her own kind did not trust her. Gloin's Dwarves did not trust her either. She did not need to understand their words to know what was being said when she spoke with Fili and Kili as if they were her friends.

They _had been_ her friends, in the wild, open lands. What they were to her now, she did not know. For five days, she had ridden alone, caught between Men and Dwarves as the gap between the two races widened. At any point, she might have reminded Fili of his promise to help her or called upon Kili who would have spoken for her, but she did not. She was proud and, what was more, she did not wish to get between them and their kin. Gloin was their cousin and had a greater claim to their loyalty than any human woman.

Betta felt the fingers of her right hand begin to tingle again. She pressed her arm against her chest, but no matter how hard she tried to pretend, she had no hand to close, no fingers to breathe upon. Her right-hand glove was in her pack, folded away and useless to her. A tear fell from her eye and traced a cold line down her cheek. She wanted nothing more than to see Fili smile again and to hear him promise that she would not be abandoned once they were back at Ered Luin, but she knew that he could promise no such thing. Among his own kind, he had changed.

.

A dozen yards behind Betta's sulking pony, Gloin rode at the head of his small company and chatted cheerfully with the nephews of Thorin Oakenshield. Fili and Kili rode on either side of their cousin, doing their best to hide their indifference to their cousin's words. Gloin had turned a good profit on his journey and he was looking ahead to a glad reunion with his fair wife once they reached Thorin's Halls, those two things being nearly all that he had spoken of for three days.

"I have been far too long in Dunland," he was saying – not for the first time, "and I will be glad to see Fris again." He sighed. "But it was good luck that brought such good fortune my way, and this journey has been well worth the delay." He chuckled to himself and clearly expected one of the brothers to ask to know more.

"An, I know there seemed little profit in it at the start," Gloin pressed on, "but there are few merchants willing to risk the northern lands, and I thought to myself… well, why not?" He fingered the silver chain about his neck.

"Yes, and you are lucky lads that I found you when I did, trapped in that dismal place. What would you have done without me!?" He laughed. "Rocks no larger than my fist and not a decent bit of iron but what has been bent into fishhooks!" He shook his head but did not really pity the tall folk who would live in what he deemed to be such squalor.

Kili sighed and pinched his ear to keep from nodding off. He had little interest in the comings and goings of merchant-Dwarves, and had tried many times to change the subject, but his cousin would talk of nothing else. One glance at Fili told him that there would be no help from that quarter; his brother had been alternately staring ahead sadly at Betta and looking guiltily down at his hands all day.

Gloin had fallen silent and frowned grumpily when neither brother filled his deliberate pause. Kili sought for a question that might yield more information than the profits of trade. "How was it, exactly, that you came to be so far north of Angmar, cousin?" he asked. "You mentioned something about some trade deal or other but have told us none of the details of your adventures on the road. It is a dangerous journey wandering so far north of Bree…"

"I _have_ told you the details," Gloin groused good-naturedly, "but you have not been listening. Your mind is elsewhere, I think."

"Well, tell it again. I am listening now," Kili said, more than a little annoyed. Gloin was a good Dwarf and loyal, but he had never been Kili's favorite cousin. His son, Gimli, was a better friend to the brothers and it was for Gimli's sake that Kili kept his temper now. "You were trading in Dunland, last I heard," he said. "Why did you leave? Was the market there not as good as you expected?"

"Ah, lad!" Gloin cried. "Dunland is a terrible place for a hard-working Dwarf! They're all penny-pinchers and coin-counters there. One Dwarf cannot even trust another to treat with him in a fair trade, not since the Hillmen began spreading their worthless wares about town and cheating every soul from the Gap to the Glanduin."

He sighed. "Yes, I was in Dunland, until about two months ago. T'was not yet the new year, late in December, I think, though I don't recall the exact week. I had word from your uncle that I and all his close kin were wanted back at Ered Luin, so we packed up and…"

"Wanted?" Kili echoed in surprise. "Thorin sent for you?"

Fili looked up and looked around. "Thorin? What does Thorin say?" There was worry in his words and more than a little apprehension in his eyes.

Gloin looked back and forth between the two brothers. His eyes were sharp, and he touched two fat fingers to his nose as he said, "Your uncle says… nothing. Nothing that shall be spoken of here." He nodded ahead toward the Men to make his meaning clear, not that it would have stopped Kili from demanding to know more, but he knew that Gloin could be as tight with his tongue as he was with his purse strings.

"As I said," Gloin went on, "I was in Dunland not long ago when I heard that Thorin wanted us home. Some, such as I, he sent for by name," He puffed up his chest proudly, "but his message was that he would welcome any of his close kin who were willing to come. Nori was with me at the time, and I'm sure he'll make the journey… if he can get off his fat-"

"Where is Gimli?" Kili interrupted, not eager to hear Gloin's thoughts on their less respectable cousin. "He went with you to Dunland, did he not?"

"Aye, he went with me and left with me, too. He'll have arrived at the Mountains by now, I don't doubt, and be with his mother. Lucky lad! I parted with him, oh, about six weeks ago upon the Greenway – though it was far more brown than green at that time. I was not about to take _him_ north and risk his wandering off into Troll-country. There may be few trolls in those hills nowadays, but the boy is far too young for such adventures, whatever he may think about it."

"Six weeks…" Fili murmured, turning his eyes ahead once more. It was little more than six weeks ago that he and his brother were both still living quite comfortably within Thorin's halls, roaming the town below and never dreaming that a chance meeting with a human woman would send them high into the hills to fight vicious wolves and raging snow-trolls.

"Yes, six weeks," Gloin said, ignorant of his cousin's thoughts. "After I heard Thorin's message, I packed up to go but I had business and a few things of my own to clear up – no reason to waste the journey. We made several stops along the North-South road all the way up to Bree. I meant to stop there a few days and then go back and cross the Brandywine at Sarn Ford before heading west… and then we came across this fine company of Men…" He nodded to the tall folk ahead of them and his laugh told what he really thought.

"I met their leader at Bree," he explained, "and learned that they were heading north into the empty lands beneath the Ettenmoors to trade what they had with the few farms there and any Rangers that they could find. Of course Farn started in on them about the orcs and hill-men and the dangers of trolls… by the end of the night, the Men were shaking in their boots at the thought of the northern lands." He laughed again, loud enough that several of the Men looked back and scowled at him, but he did not care.

"I had a few hearty lads to spare who were willing to go, and when it came time to leave Bree, we divvied up our stores and I sent Gimli on ahead with what I had promised along the western road. The rest, we took north with our axes and swords, hiring ourselves out as the tall folk's guard. It meant taking the long way 'round, but gold is gold, eh, lad?"

Kili shrugged. He admired well-wrought gold as much as any Dwarf and knew the value of the coins in his pocket, but he had never understood the eagerness with which his cousin counted what coins he had against what he might earn.

"So, you and these Men went north to the Ettenmoors?" he asked.

"Oh, not so far as that. We swung northwest across the wastes and made for the North Downs, stopping among the homesteads and trading with the Shirefolk that we met along the way. There's not really much use for guards up there. Hardly any folk of any kind but the Rangers, and we saw neither hide nor hair of any troll. We challenged a few skittish orcs upon the northern edge of the plain, but they were scared off easily enough.

"Always get your pay up-front, lad!" Gloin said, laughing. "It saves a great deal of trouble in the end. The tall folk were not glad when they realized that they had hired guards for no reason, and that we were taking nearly all the trade from them!

"It was a pleasant ride for us, though, even if it was a bit cold at the end. We made good time on the road toward Emyn Uial, and if we had kept up the pace, I might have beaten Gimli home. We found your ponies near to that old bridge, by the way. You remember the one, don't you, lad?" He looked at Kili. "Or, no… it was your brother I took there, wasn't it…" He looked to Fili instead, but Fili was not listening. Gloin followed Fili's gaze and frowned when he saw that it was the human woman who had stolen Fili's attention away.

"You found them near the bridge, you say?" Kili said quickly, hoping to distract his cousin. "We lost them many leagues north of there. A pack of wolves came upon us in the night and they bolted. We were forced to go on foot from there."

"Hmm…" Gloin shook his head and looked away from Fili. "Wolves, you say? Lucky that you escaped, but I never saw any of them around. Heard them, though, howling in the distance. We met the ice-traders the day after and they filled the tall folk there with talk of profits in the far north. They hadn't fared as well as we had in Eriador and decided to keep going rather than turn back south. I had iron left to trade and your ponies seemed strong enough once they were fed that we hitched them to the heavier wagons and went on.

"At Emyn Uial, we turned north and then… well, you know the rest. We stopped at two villages of the snow-people before we got word to go on to the one you were at. Lucky you were that I did not turn back! It was farther than I meant to go." He smiled, and Kili smiled, too. It _had_ been lucky that Gloin had found them. Without the Dwarven company and with no money or no ponies to ride, he didn't know how long it would have taken him and his brother to get home. They might easily have arrived too late to join Thorin's quest.

Kili smiled but his eyes drifted from Gloin to his brother, and he saw the sadness in Fili's eyes. Gloin urged his pony forward, riding between the two brothers and blocking Kili's gaze.

"Yes," Gloin said, "I thank my lucky boots and good business sense that I discovered you when I did. What was Thorin thinking, letting you two wander off that way? Well, in a few more days, we'll be back at Ered Luin, and he'll have you both back under thumb."

.

Night fell early in winter across the northern lands and all was dark and quiet. The mismatched assortment of wagons and animals made camp beneath a long, low overhang of rock less than a day's ride from the shores of the River Lhun, but Gloin meant to go another day south before attempting to ford the frigid waters near the crossing that Fili had used many weeks ago when he led his own much smaller company across to the eastern shore. There, the river was shallow and there would be less chance of their wagon being overwhelmed by the grinding blocks of broken ice that floated down from its still-frozen source. Before then, Gloin meant to bid farewell to the company of Men; the tall folk with their heavily laden wagons must go all the way down to the ferry above the confluence of the Little Lhun before they could cross over and head toward the town.

After the crossing, it was an easy ride west to Thorin's Halls, and Gloin looked forward to it, but Betta was uncertain. She had long ago made up her mind to follow Fili at least as far as the town beneath Ered Luin, but she had not yet decided whether she would stay there and for how long. In her heart, she had begun to doubt whether she could ever call those stony hills home.

Both Men and Dwarves had arranged their wagons in a line between the trees and the stone wall behind their two separate campsites. The Dwarves had built their own fire and roasted their own game that they had caught among the scattered trees that grew on either side of the road as they travelled. It was mainly squirrel and rabbit, but they mixed the fresh meat with what was left of their preserves into a fine stew, not a bite of which was offered to the Men.

Not that the tall folk would have had any of it. They had not bothered to hunt but had as much as they needed to eat from their own supplies and from the fish that they had bought from the Lossoth. The scent of fried sea-salt and fat mingled with the smoke of simmering stew, both equally delicious, but the Men would not have swallowed even a mouthful of the Dwarven fare, and the Dwarves would rather choke than eat fish from a Man's frying pan.

Both camps set their watches for the night, each not trusting the other to look out for any but his own, yet even the Men whose fears had once been stoked by the whispering of Dwarves now knew that there was little chance of danger. The usual assortment of bandits and thieves would be found in these hills, of course, but they would not dare assault so large and well-armed a company, and more wary folk than they would have laughed to think of orcs venturing so near to Elvish lands. It was but a stone's throw to the Grey havens in the south, and Forlond lay beyond.

Kili sat alone on the ground at the edge of the Dwarves' camp closest to the camp of the tall folk. He pushed the food about in his bowl, eating it but with little appetite. _He_ knew that some orcs did indeed venture west. Hadn't he seen with his own eyes the trouble that they might cause? He frowned as he listened to the laughter and songs of the Men and remembered the exciting tales that Betta had told them of her own people in the south. He would rather have heard new tales from the tall folk than listened to the same old legends that the Dwarves told about their own fires, and which he would hear again anyway once they were back at Ered Luin.

What was the point in travelling if you only stayed among your own kind? Kili thought to himself and knew that it was a very un-Dwarf-like thought to think.

Fili stepped out of the darkness of the trees behind his brother. He re-fastened the buckle of his belt as he approached the camp. Kili handed him his bowl as he sat down, but Fili had even less appetite than his little brother. He, too, was wrapped up in memories of the past, of two dead men lying in the dirt beneath the evergreens upon the road to the Lhun. He remembered Betta kneeling down beside the body of the boy, and how strange it had been to see her grieving for one who had once attacked. Of course, that had been before he knew her history and had heard of the deaths of her five brothers. Fili sighed and wished for the nights when he and his brother had sat alone with their guide and laugh and tease each other without fear of censure.

Kili tipped up his bowl to drink the last few drops of broth. He had tasted real hunger beneath the mountains of Angmar and would never again turn down good food. Looking over at his brother, he saw that Fili had hardly touched his stew but knew that it was no daintiness of appetite that held him back. He looked toward the darker shadows between the two camps where Betta made her own small camp, and he sighed.

"You should go talk to her," he told Fili, "while Gloin is busy with the wagon. Bring her something to eat. She cannot always be swallowing the Lossoth's dried fish or whatever it is that the tall folk toss her way."

"They are her own race," Fili said, but he stood up as if he meant to do as Kili suggested. At the same moment, at tall, narrow shadow stepped away from the Men's camp and walked toward Betta's tent. Fili sat down again.

"There he is again," he grumbled, his hand tightening into a fist.

Kili watched the young man make his way toward Betta's pup tent – a tent which that same young man had provided for her when the Dwarves insisted that they had no canvas to spare. It was one of those items that merchants carried in anticipation of some misfortune – a broken wagon-wheel or injured horse – that would force them to leave behind part of their goods, covered and hidden, to be retrieved later, but it was also warm and dry. Gloin _would_ have a similar tent of his own, but he had conveniently forgotten about it.

The lad's name was Tom, Fili knew, but little else had they been able to discover since the two camps were so stubbornly separated. Tom had begun to be friendly with Betta while the company was still at the Lossoth village when she was still sleeping and eating with Ix's family in their hut, and it was not until they set out on the long road home that she had found herself caught between the two races. With no company but her own, she had gratefully accepted Tom's friendship and was glad that he ignored the jeers of his people to sit with her.

Each night, after the caravan had made camp, it was Tom who took care of Betta's pony, bushing it down and leading it to the pickets with the Men's horses. He built her fire and brought her food. He sat and ate with her, too, and it was he not Fili who spoke to her and kept her spirits high which might otherwise have fallen too low to bear.

Tonight, Tom arrived at Betta's tent with bowl and cup in hand. He knelt down and looked inside, but the woman herself had gone into the trees a few minutes before and had not yet returned. The young man sat down to wait for her, feeding a few sticks into the fire.

"She is not there. Leave the food and go, damn you," Fili muttered under his breath.

Kili rolled his eyes. He understood why Betta could no longer share the same tent as he and his brother, and why she did not feel welcome among their kin, but it had been Fili's choice to distance himself from her, to avoid speaking to her or offering her any assistance that she needed. He might easily have ridden beside her at any point in the journey, suffering only sharp looks and a disappointed frown from Gloin. None of the other Dwarves who were with them would dare to speak against Thorin's heir.

Betta's familiar shape emerged from the trees and she walked slowly back to her tent. She sat down beside Tom and took the bowl that he handed to her. They ate quietly together, and Kili strained his ears to hear what was said, but though the wind would sometimes carry to him the murmur of their voices, he could not make out the words. Fili scowled and listened, also. He set aside his dinner.

Kili took up the bowl and put it back into his brother's hands. "Finish it," he ordered. "You will not last long eating only your jealousy."

"He is a boy, not even a _grown_ man," Fili muttered, "a stripling with no beard…"

"Then you have no reason to be jealous. What do you expect her to do when you ignore her for days?" Kili shook his head. "They talk, that is all. You think that she could love him as she loves you? Ha!" Kili laughed at the thought of any woman choosing any man over his brother.

"And yet, he is of her own race," Fili said. He ate his cold stew without tasting it and set aside the empty bowl.

It was about the same time that Tom and Betta finished their own meal. The young man stood up and bid her good night then left her.

"There, he is gone now," Kili said. "Go and speak with her."

But Fili shook his head. "Gloin will be finished with the wagon soon. It does not take long to patch a wheel, and I would rather postpone that argument until I must deal with Thorin." He saw Kili's disappointed look and forced himself to smile. "Besides, Betta is a clever woman. She knows why I keep my distance."

He turned his eyes back to her tent, but she had put out the fire and had crawled inside to sleep. "Once we are all back at Ered Luin, when she is stowed away safe and secret in Nan's cabin, then we shall have our time together," he said. "Then, we shall…"

"You are a fool if you think so," Kili said so sharply that he shook his brother out of his musings and Fili looked up in surprise. "You are a fool to waste a single moment with her when we have the dragon in Erebor breathing down our necks!"

"Hush!" Fili said. "Do not speak that name! We are too far south, and you heard what Gloin said. There may be other ears listening…"

"Then I will not say the name, but I will say again that you are a fool to neglect her." Kili was impatient with his brother's stubbornness, but he was also angry with himself. He knew that he, too, might have ridden ahead with Betta or spoken to her upon the road. He might have done so with less loss of dignity than the heir of Oakenshield. What did it matter what Gloin thought of their friendship with a Betta? She had done more than enough to earn their love and loyalty during their Quest to Forochel.

"Perhaps you are wise to be jealous, brother," Kili said after a long pause. "After all, she is not a Dwarf-woman, and you know that the tall folk are not bound to their first love. Some of them even marry twice or more and their lives are short. Betta loves you now, but for how long if you continue to ignore her?"

Fili's face had been pensive, but now he looked at Kili with open fear. "She would not…" he protested.

"Whether or not she would, I know that if _I_ were in your place, Fili, I would not risk it. I would not waste one minute that I had with the woman that I loved."

"Be glad that you are _not_ in my place," Fili said. "I hope that you never are."

At that moment, Gloin joined them and interrupted their talk. The broken wheel had been patched and he sat down, plucking a few stray splinters of wood from his thick, red beard. "That is the last time that I purchase any metal-work from the tall folk!" he said.

Kili knew what was expected of him. "Why did you, cousin?" he asked obediently.

"That wheel picked the wrong time to split, lad, the very worst time. We were miles out from Bree and not a forge to be found nor any friendly Dwarves. The Rangers are good folk, I suppose, if you are in for that sort of thing – wandering about and worrying all others with your strange ways. Their iron got us farther than the brittle bolts of the forges of Bree would have done, but true Dwarven steel would have gotten us farther. It is lucky that Thralin has his kit with him, and Thrin can make iron out of sand, given time. It is only a patch, but a patch is enough to get us home, eh?"

He smiled and looked at the brothers, but Kili had hardly heard his cousin's talk and Fili was still looking into the shadows that hid Betta's tent.

Gloin's smile disappeared. "Now," he said sternly, "I have not yet heard how it was that the two of you came to be so far north… and how you were roped into wandering with a human woman." He looked closely at Fili, but the night was dark and the fires were distant; he could not read the expression on his face. "I cannot imagine that Thorin would consent to such a journey, and she certainly does not look as if she could afford a Dwarven guard, not even of common Dwarves…"

"Thorin _did_ consent to it," Kili said, "and for reasons that we will not speak of here." He gave Gloin a pointed look that spoke of other conversations and other words that the old Dwarf had refused to say.

Gloin stared at him in amazement, unable to imagine any way that Betta's journey might be connected to Erebor or to the two brothers. "But how is she…?"

Kili raised an eyebrow and Gloin shut his mouth. All day, he had resisted Kili's constant questions regarding Thorin's message and what Gloin knew of their future quest. He was not at all pleased at being put off but knew that he could not demand answers without providing them in return.

"Thorin consent to this!" he muttered. "He let you run around Eriador with one of the tall folk's women… a one-handed woman, at that!" He shook his head. "I do not believe it."

"She did not always have only one hand."

Gloin harrumphed into his beard. "That adds little in her favor," he said.

"She saved my life," Kili said, growing angry. "More than once, she saved both our lives, but perhaps you find no _profit_ in that, cousin Gloin."

"She has no gold," he said matter-of-factly, "nor any goods to trade. No, I see no profit in her, and neither should either of you if you were in your right minds. You have had too much travel than is good for a young lad. Your lives would have been safe enough if you had stayed at home."

Kili bit his tongue, knowing that no words of his could change his cousin's mind, but Fili was reminded of the wild wolves upon the foothills of Angmar and the dark tunnels underground. He remembered Kili's pale, bloodless face when the wolves had nearly killed him – but Betta had saved his life. She had saved him again, nearly sacrificing her own life when the orcs attacked them underground, and for that she had lost her hand. She had saved Fili's own life from the snow-troll.

The anger was too much for him to swallow. "You know _nothing_, Gloin!" Fili said sharply and rose to his feet. "You know nothing of Betta and nothing of me if you think that I would value any weight of gold over a good woman and a brave fighter."

"Ha!" Gloin cried, but he was caught by surprise. He had thought that Fili was still the stubborn but soft-spoken Dwarf that he had known many months ago in the Blue Mountains. "I only say what every Dwarf here thinks," he insisted.

"Not every Dwarf," Kili said and stood beside his brother.

"Keep your thoughts to yourself, cousin," Fili said. His hand was on his axe, but he had no intention of drawing it. "If you insult that woman again, we must fight, and I would not willingly raise my hand against my own kin. Tomorrow, Betta will ride with me, and if you do not like it, then ride behind the wagon with the others where you need not see us together."

Fili did not wait for Gloin's sputtered reply. He nodded to his brother and then left the Dwarves' campsite, walking toward Betta's tent. Kili watched as Fili knelt down before the opening. He guessed that his brother spoke to her, but what was her reply could only be imagined. It must have been good, because a moment later, Fili crawled into the low tent with her and Kili sighed. He looked over at Gloin, expecting the old Dwarf to be full of anger and disgust, but Gloin only shook his head sadly.

"It is as I suspected," he said. "Your poor, foolish brother… You would do well to warn him that it is a long and lonely road he walks, Kili."

"He knows it already."

"Does he? Well, I hope that she is worth all the trouble that she will cause." He sighed. "At least he should have waited until after… after… well, you know. These are not the wild lands, and Fili is no common Dwarf that he might throw his life away. He is Thorin's heir, and Thorin will not be glad to hear of this."

"Just as Fili would not be glad to hear that news has reached our uncle's ears before Fili himself brings it to him," Kili said, but frowned and wondered whether it would not be better if they waited to break the news until after Erebor, as his cousin suggested.

Gloin shrugged. "As you like it," he said. "I will keep this secret gladly."

He walked away, shaking his head and muttering under his breath. He left Kili to finish out the watch alone, and it was just as well. Kili could not have slept on a warm, feather bed with so many uncomfortable thoughts stuck in his head.

.

After Fili had told off Gloin and walked away from his cousin and brother, he could feel his heart pounding in his chest and the sweat was cold on his brow. It was as if he had fought a deadly battle and had just escaped with his life, but the true battle was yet to come. Would Betta forgive him his cowardice? And how would he face Thorin if he felt this way after confronting Gloin and with his brother beside him?

He approached the tent anxiously and knelt down. The ground was hard and damp under his knee as he looked into the darkness. The moon lit only the edge of her boot near the entrance; all the rest of her was in shadow.

"Are you awake, Betta," he whispered.

She gave no answer, yet he heard movement inside.

"I have been a fool and full of pride," he said, "but that is nothing new. Will you forgive me? Might I sit with you awhile?"

He heard her quiet breath and finally her voice. "There is no room for sitting," she said. "And it is cold in here, but you are welcome."

He ducked under the low tent and crawled inside. As she said, the pup tent had little room to spare and even a Dwarf sitting down would hit his head on the roof. It was too dark to see, and he could only feel where she was. Betta already lay lengthwise and from head to toe she was nearly as tall as the tent was long. Fili stretched out alongside her, unable to lay anywhere where his side was not pressed against hers, but he had more room to spare at his feet being several inches shorter than she was.

"So, you forgive me, then?" he asked softly.

"There is nothing to forgive," she said, but he knew that she was lying.

"Will you let me stay awhile? This tent is cold, and two bodies may warm it more quickly than one."

"Stay as long as you like," she said. "Stay forever." He smiled and reached out, searching for her hand. He felt her flinch back. "Be careful!" she warned him. "My arm…"

"I know." It pained him to think of that wounded limb. Taking more care, he found her left hand and held it tight in his, then lay down with his head pillowed on his arm. "Sleep now. I will have to slip away in the early morning hours, but tomorrow you will ride on my pony with me."

"No," Betta shook her head, "I am quite strong enough to ride upon my own pony. I am glad that you are no longer ashamed of me, Fili, but you will be home soon and you will have more important things to worry about. We should not be seen together."

Fili frowned, but he did not object. He knew in his heart that Betta was right and it would not do for him to flaunt their relationship. Dwarves could talk as much as Men, and there would be rumors enough once Gloin said his piece back at the mountains, but Fili hated to think that no one but he and his brother would ever know all that she had done for them. If a Dwarf had done all that she had done for Thorin's nephews, he would have been held in high honor.

Fili closed his eyes and was soon fast asleep, but Betta lay awake a little longer, enjoying the feel of his hand in hers and his arm around her. She savored the moment, not knowing when would be their last night together. The pain in her phantom limb was forgotten; she forgot that she was maimed at all.

* * *

**Hello, wonderful readers! and a special welcome to those who made it all the way through QtF.**

**Let me know what you think, REVIEW! REVIEW! Getting your comments and knowing that you are reading along is the only reason that I put myself through the torment of grammar corrections and meeting update deadlines ;)**

**Yours, always,**

**-Paint**


	2. Decisions Made

**Middle-earth, and all who dwell within it, belong to Tolkien - Except my OCs, because he wouldn't want them anyway ;). Please review!**

* * *

Early in the morning, before the sun rose, Kili shook himself awake and moved quietly, carefully toward Betta's tent. He made sure that he was not seen by Thrin, who had been assigned the morning watch and was nodding nearby, leaning against the wheel of their wagon. As he crept across the no-man's-land between the two camps, he could hear the soft morning sounds of the horses and the chirping of birds. The air smelt of early spring and late winter in turns, depending on the direction of the wind.

Kili arrived at the tent and knelt down; he reached in to take hold of his brother's boot and shook him. He had little patience for Fili's mumbled curses, and he refused to let go of his brother's leg until Fili had woken fully and was crawling out of the tent, fully dressed and complaining that he had been pulled away from Betta's warm arms.

"I would have woken myself," Fili protested, but a wide yawn cut short his words, and left his face split by a sheepish grin. "Well, I would have slipped out without being seen, anyway," he said with a shrug, but Kili was not as indifferent to what their company saw.

"There will be trouble enough today when we ride beside her today," he said. "I do not want to have to explain to Gloin and all the rest why you are sneaking out of a woman's tent – any woman's tent, Dwarf of human – in the early morning hours. Think what rumors will fall from that!"

"The rumors would be false whatever they are," Fili said. "We spoke and we slept, that is all." He was annoyed that his brother was determined to give him a second rude awakening after the first, but he sighed. "You are right to be cautious, Kili, thank you, but I am tired. I wish to think only of breakfast and of the morning ride. Is it too much to ask for one day that I need not worry over what tomorrow will bring?"

"You may ask for it, but you will not get it. Not if I have anything to say about it."

But Fili waved him off and was already walking toward the line of trees east of their camp. Kili shook his head at him and then ducked down once more to look into the tent. Betta lay still and her eyes were closed, but he knew better than to think that she was asleep.

"Well, what do you have to say for yourself?" he asked, and his expression was stern.

Betta opened one eye to look at him, then she sat up with a groan, holding her maimed arm close to her chest as she twisted her shoulders to work the knots from her neck and back. "I have half the temptation of your brother," she said, "having only one hand to keep to myself, but keep it I did. Not that I need to say anything about it to _you_. I am a free woman and may do as I choose to do."

"I am not trying to shame you…"

"And I am not ashamed," she said, but her smile did not return. She was thoughtful and looked down at the pressed ground where Fili had lain last night. "I only wish that I knew what he has planned for the future. I did not think that he would speak to me until we reached Ered Luin, but then he says that he will stay the night. He risks being discovered. He used to be cautious, but now…"

Fili had returned from the trees and stood at a distance waiting for his brother to join him nearer to the Dwarf camp.

"No," Kili said, keeping his voice low, "he is as cautious as ever he was, but caution has never stopped my brother once he sets his mind to doing something. When we set out for the north half-supplied and without a clear path, it was because his willfulness outweighed his caution. I fear that the same will happen again. Fili will make up his mind, but to what end, I cannot see. Where will he lead us this time?"

"To adventure," Betta said, smiling sadly, but Kili's face was worried and he shook his head.

"No, to our uncle, and Thorin is not as easy to manage as orcs and trolls." He glanced at her once more and then left to rejoin his brother, but though Betta could not see Fili from inside her tent, she remembered Kili's anxious eyes and the morning was less bright to her for many hours after.

.

Fili and Kili entered the Dwarf camp together and pretended for Thrin's sake that they had both slept there all night. Neither brother needed to fake his yawning and tired eyes as they kindled the breakfast fire and took the lid off the pot to heat the cold and crusty remains of last night's stew.

Fili had planned to bring Betta her breakfast that morning, but Kili's words made him take care and he waited for Gloin and the other Dwarves to fill their bowls and move away. By then, there was only the over-cooked dregs left to be scraped from the bottom. It was just as well, he could see Tom was already up and walking toward Betta's tent with a plate of bread and cheese in his hand. There seemed to be something up in the Men's camp. They were packing their wagons more quickly this morning and almost as soon as Tom had delivered Betta's food, he began to take down the tent that he had lent her and carried it back to camp.

The pup-tent was stowed away, and Betta's pony brought from the pickets where the Men's horses were tied. The Dwarf camp was barely packed by the time Tom was helping Betta to mount her pony. For a moment, Fili was afraid that Tom meant to take her ahead with him into the Men's caravan, but at the last moment, the lad touched her hand and drew away, hurrying back to his own company. Betta was left to sit alone upon the confused beast for some time before the Dwarves were ready to set out.

The Men's company left first and Betta had to hold back her pony to keep it from following. The Dwarves grumbled at the tall folk's impatience, but they did not hurry, and there was a quarter of a mile between the two parties before Gloin motioned for his wagon to move. At first, Betta rode the usual distance ahead, leaving a dozen yards behind her before the Dwarves' wagon, even though it meant that she lost sight of the Men's horses whenever they turned a bend in the road. She waited, not knowing what Fili had planned, but after an hour, she grew impatient and looked back.

Fili and Kili rode together at the head of their company, but Gloin had been warned and was hanging back with the other Dwarves. He shot many frowning looks toward Fili's back, but most went unnoticed and the rest were ignored. Seeing Betta look back at him, Fili smiled and raised his reins to urge his pony on ahead and catch up with her, but before he could do so, Betta had pulled up her own reins and her pony stopped walking. With no other horses or wagons to hurry after, the animal was content to wait for its friends to come up from behind.

Kili grinned and Fili shrugged his shoulders; they kept their speed until they were alongside Betta, but there was no need for them to slow or for her to shake the reins. Her pony began to walk of its own accord and easily kept pace with the other two. The three animals were fast friends after all the adventures they had suffered together, and they had missed each other.

Fili could feel the weight of Gloin's eyes on his back, and he could hear the other Dwarves muttering in their own speech at the seeming impertinence of Betta's choice to ride with the brothers. They could not know that it had been Fili's choice to ride with her and that she had only anticipated his decision. To their eyes, she had forced her company on the heir of Thorin Oakenshield, and it was an embarrassment too terrible to endure.

But Fili _was_ Thorin's heir and nephew and he did not complain or reject the human of their company; there was nothing that the other, less-noble Dwarves could do. It was not their place to question Fili or Kili when their uncle would have words enough for them once they reached the Gates of Ered Luin.

Gloin's silence, too, was taken as consent. The old merchant was leader of their party, and he would have the final say when they made camp for the night.

"Good morning," Betta said, smiling at Fili. She knew that she had beaten him to their reconciliation and was not aware of the irritation that she had caused among the Dwarves behind.

"Good morning," Fili said, and he looked closely at her, measuring the color of her cheeks against the fading of her bruises. She was still too pale and thin after her ordeal in the northern lands, but the warm southern air would soon set her to rights, and he hoped that being within scent of the sea would raise her spirits as well. Her look was older than it had been before their long journey, but at the same time, her smile and her laugh was more free now that her quest of many years was ended.

"It _is_ a good morning," he decided, determined to ignore the grumbling voices behind him. "By nightfall we should be beside the river, and tonight or tomorrow will see us upon the other side. In less than three days, I'd put money on it, we will be within sight of the Gates again, and then…" his words faltered and he did not know what then. He looked to his brother.

"How is your arm today, Betta," Kili asked cheerfully.

She shrugged with one shoulder, a gesture that seemed to have replaced the distracted way that she used to use her right hand to pull at her hair. "The arm is weak and useless to me now," she said, "but it heals as well as expected, and I hardly feel the pain of it anymore."

That was a lie, Kili knew. He could see the pain crease the corners of her mouth when her pony skipped over the hard stones, but he knew better than to expect her to get over the amputation overnight. That she was 'as well as expected' was as well as any of them had a right to expect.

.

All morning, the three friends rode together and talked quietly amongst themselves, but as the day passed and the sky grew cloudy, even Betta and Kili began to feel the added weight of the eyes upon them. The other Dwarves were sullen, but even the company of Men who had ridden far ahead had noticed that the stray woman was back among the Dwarven-folk. They did not like it. They did not like the Dwarves.

There could be no free word spoken while the trio were watched on all sides. Fili talked mainly of the weather and the state of the road while Kili spoke of the sparse trees and low hills, wondering whether they might not catch some larger game here, an elk or wild boar that had woken early from its winter slumber. Betta said little, even when Kili asked her opinions on the hunt. She was silent and sad, and he remembered that she still carried her father's bow tied to her saddle though the weapon was useless without two hands to hold it.

Even less was said that afternoon, though the clouds departed and the sky was blue again. Fili had begun to think hard on the days ahead and Kili was glad to see his brother's pensive face looking often toward the mountains that were marching close upon their right.

The afternoon passed slowly and evening began to creep in. The sun sank toward the horizon, touching the highest peaks of the Ered Luin. The company of Dwarves had reached a place where the road drew up close to the banks of the wide river and Gloin called Fili back to ride beside him so that they might keep an eye out for a safe place to cross. That was not his only reason, however, and he neglected his task to keep his eyes on his cousin while Fili more often looked ahead to Betta than sidelong at the swift-flowing stream.

For some time, the two Dwarves rode in stony silence while the shadows grew long around them. After their argument the night before, neither wished to be the first to speak to the other, but Fili was young and his stubbornness was fresh from the forge; it had not been made brittle by the passage of long years. Eventually, Gloin sighed and urged his pony closer to Fili's. He said, "If you are determined to stay upon this course, lad, at least you must see the wisdom in keeping her secret. Thorin has all his hope pinned upon you and your brother. What would your mother say?"

Fili winced. He might have shrugged off Thorin's worries and insisted that Kili would still produce the heir that would carry on Durin's line. And Fili was convinced that he might still rule successfully as King of Durin's folk – even if Betta would never be acknowledged his queen – if Thorin would only put aside his determined distrust of Men and publicly declare his support for his nephew's choice of bride.

But what of Dis? What of the proud Dwarf-woman who lived now only in his memories? Dis would not have been glad to hear that her eldest son had pledged himself to one of the tall folk's women. She had been as traditional as Gloin, as proud as Thorin, and as quick to anger as any Dwarf-man whose family had once been threatened. Dis would not have accepted Betta as her daughter-in-law. Had his mother been alive, the best that Fili could have hoped for was that she would have given her gold for the journey before sending Betta away.

"My mother is dead," Fili said, feeling the weight of the word and the finality of saying it aloud. He remembered the dream that he had had beneath the mountains of Angmar, the sound of his future children laughing merrily as they played together, but that dream was gone now.

He looked ahead toward Betta, and his eyes traced the laughing profile of her face as she turned to answer back at some joke that Kili had made.

"I am not ashamed of her," Fili said quietly, and it was true. "She is brave and strong and deserves honor for all that she has suffered," he spoke with growing force to his words. "She has done more than enough for my brother and I, saved our lives more than once…" He sat up straight in his saddle and nodded, his mind made up. "Kili will marry and carry on Thorin's line. And besides, why should I feel more shame that my uncle who has chosen not to marry at all. He produced no heir of his own. Why should I be held to do more than that?"

"You are his sister's son, Fili. Your uncle deserves more respect from you," Gloin said, and was satisfied to see Fili's pride diminished a little, but only a little. "Well, if this woman has saved you and your brother from danger, then I am sure that Thorin will agree that some reward is due to her, but not the reward of his own nephew."

Fili frowned. Gloin looked at Betta and turned up his nose. "She may be brave, as you say, but she is not very fine to look at, is she…?"

Fili scowled and turned to speak sharply to his cousin, but Gloin had turned his eyes downwards and was looking into his cupped hand. Fili had never seen the images carved inside the metal locket that Gloin wore about his neck, images of his wife and son that Gloin had drawn with his own hand. There were many such lockets around the necks of many such Dwarves who loved their families. Thorin himself, though most did not know it, wore the image of his mother beneath his shirt. Nis had been killed at Erebor when the dragon attacked.

Fili sighed. Gloin had always thought his wife more beautiful than any woman of any race. There would be no arguing with him on that point. "What does it matter to me how Betta looks to you," he said, turning his own eyes toward his own woman with a greater appreciation for her hairless chin.

"I love her, Gloin, and if there were any way to change my feelings for her now, I would not wish to do it. I admit that I began to love her before she proved herself worthy of it, and at that time I might have given her up with little pain to myself. I might have been convinced to go back to my mountain and send her away to her sea-coast to be forgotten, but she _has_ proven herself. She _has_ saved my brother's life, and yet you ask me to abandon her?"

"I do," Gloin said, "for your sake and the sake of your family, but I see in your eyes that nothing that _I_ say will change your mind. I only hope that your uncle has stronger words than mine, but if he proves unfit for the challenge, then all that I can say is _take care_! Not even your stubborn pride and stern look will force our people to accept her. Keep your woman hidden. That is how it has always been done, and how it _will_ always be done. For her sake and your own, keep her secret or you will disgrace yourself and all your family, too!"

With that, Gloin shook the reins and urged his pony forward. Fili had no chance to reply and nothing that he would have said if he had been given the chance. He felt the sting of his cousin's angry words and turned his bleary eyes to the river. Not since he had been a child chastised by his father had he felt his heart in such turmoil, and he wished that he had still the certainty that he had felt last night. Could Gloin be right? Only a few Dwarves that Fili had heard of had ever married outside their own kind. All had come from common stock and all, besides Nan - who was a Blacklock and so did not hardly count - had come to a bad end. At the same time, all but Nan had kept their spouses a secret, living apart from both Men and Dwarves. Fili could do no such thing. With the quest to Erebor looming ahead of him, he could not abandon Thorin and Kili to the dragon. Thorin might disown his heir, but Fili could not give up his duty to his people for the fifty years or more that Betta's short life would last, nor could he abandon her.

He shook his head. No, he could not, and he could not ask her to hide herself away in a cave somewhere, living on the hope that he would perhaps find some time to visit her when his duties were not pressing. It was cruel enough that he asked her to wait for him while he went to reclaim Erebor, a journey of a more than a year at the best of times!

An hour passed, and Fili was no closer to calming his anxious thoughts but he had at least spotted a promising ford across the river before the failing light left them. Gloin agreed that it was the best place to cross and he guided their small party to the side of the road where they would make camp for the night.

The ford was farther north than the place where Fili, Kili and Betta had crossed on their eastward journey. They were many miles north, in fact, and Fili was glad for it. He was glad that he would not need to retrace his steps along the road as it curved beneath the evergreen copse where he imagined three corpses yet lay under their accursed branches.

No, the ford here was wider and the water swifter, though the riverbed was not much deeper than the other had been. The water was colder, however, and though Gloin was a dangerous Dwarf to barter with, he chose his risks wisely. They would not try the crossing now that night had fallen and the shadows of the trees lay thick about them.

"The river will be there in the morning, lads," he said, climbing down from his pony and ordering the Dwarves to unload the tents and make camp. "Tomorrow we'll cross it and in two days' time we will be back at Ered Luin, and I will be kissing my wife and son."

Fili dismounted and went to help Betta. He did not need to look back to know that the old dwarf was watching him. Instead, he smiled and held out his arm to help her down. She could never be the mother of his children, but he did not love her any less for that. He would have many babes to bounce upon his knee, his nieces and nephews, Kili's daughters and sons. Fili's choice was made.

"Take care," Kili said, as Betta prepared to dismount. Fili held the pony's bridle and reached for her arm, but she pushed his hand away.

"I must learn to do this someday myself," she said. "Why not today?"

Reluctantly, Fili stepped back but kept his hands ready to catch her. Betta held tight to the rim of the saddle with her left hand and, after a deep breath, she swung her right leg over and dropped to the ground. It was the first time that she had not had Tom hurrying back to help her down and lead her pony away, but she managed it with little injury and only a turned ankle – the same ankle that she had done far worse to when a grumpy snow-troll had knocked her off his roof.

Back on solid ground, she sighed and stopped to allow herself a rare moment of satisfaction before Fili touched her shoulder and she turned to smile at him.

"Next, I must learn to climb up on my own," she said.

"Yes, next," Fili agreed, "but not yet." She and his brother had been riding too far ahead to hear Gloin's announcement and so he delivered the news that their much-smaller party would be crossing the river come morning and turning their course west once more.

Kili laughed to think how close they were to home, but Betta's good humor faded and she turned her back to them to unfasten her bag form the pony's back – a difficult task with one hand. She cast a glance down the road, but the Men had not stopped at dusk and she could no longer see them in the growing dark. Their leader had been eager to leave the Dwarves behind as soon as he could, but Betta wished that she had been able to say a proper farewell to Tom and to thank him for the help he had given her. He had said that the company might eventually stop at the town beneath Thorin's Halls before returning to their own lands, but that was not certain and Betta guessed that she would never see her friend again.

Fili saw Betta's look and said nothing. He hid his smile, being happy that the Men were finally gone from them and that there would be no more trouble from the young man who had caught so much of Betta's eye in recent days.

They set about making camp. Kili was able to "discover" Gloin's spare tent among the baggage and the old dwarf grudgingly allowed them to fashion it alongside their own for Betta. The other Dwarves had begun complaining again once they realized that the human woman would not be riding ahead to rejoin her own kind. Thrin was openly angry at the intrusion. He did not dare complain to Fili and Kili themselves, but Gloin overheard his words and thanked his luck that at least Fili had waited a few days before acting as he did. It was a simple thing to excuse the brothers, saying that they had agreed to see the woman to the end of her journey – an end which was naturally back at the town, not upon the road in the middle of the wilderness. Of course, the heirs of Durin's own line could not shirk their duty or break their oath, even to one of the tall folk. Besides, Gloin said, she was injured and though she did not belong to their race, still the Men of the caravan were not her kin. An honorable Dwarf was not cruel, he told them, and it would be cruel indeed to abandon the woman to the kindness of _those_ Men.

Reluctantly, the Dwarves agreed. In truth, most of them had little grudge against Betta herself and once the Men of the caravan had moved off, they settled into a merry mood. That Fili and Kili respected the woman prevented them from evicting her from their camp; that Gloin had defended her – however angrily – shut them up entirely.

Indeed, the mood soon became quite cheerful. Any discomfort might be endured now that the Blue Mountains were near and they had all the comforts of home to look forward to. Fili and Kili went back and forth between their fellow Dwarves, talking freely with them, and there was even singing in the camp when Betta was not nearby. All eyes turned eagerly toward the shadows of the mountains where they rose up black against the starry sky, and Kili spoke eloquently on the subject of sleeping in one's own bed.

Betta smiled at his poetry but ate her meal in silence. These hills were not her home. She could not look forward to family, and the only part of their destination that was familiar to her was the town below and an inn where she had spent all of three days nearly two months ago.

Fili saw Betta's sadness but could think of nothing to say that would ease it for her. "Nan will look after you," he said, laying a gentle hand upon her shoulder.

Kili cleared his throat and nodded over his brother's shoulders. They had built a smaller fire for Betta away from the cook fire near the wagon where the other Dwarves sat talking together, but with two fires burning and eyes not yet heavy with sleep, they could still be seen. Fili took back his hand.

"At least they cannot blame me if I offered to change your bandages for you," he muttered.

He had not see her injured arm since the day before they had left the Lossoth village. As penance for his neglect of her, Fili refused to avert his eyes from the worst of the bruised and swollen stump of her arm. He swallowed the lump in his throat as he carefully wiped around the black stitches made from animal hair and cleaned away the pale blood that seeped through the seams of skin where it had been folded over the sawn-off bone. The faded bruises were yellow and green, and the texture of the rough bandage material had mottled her arm.

"Elm did a good job with this," Fili said, forcing his stomach to hold down the fresh meal he had just given it. "You will have hardly a scar once the wound has fully healed. A year only, I think…"

"Large or small, I do not see how any size scar could be a comfort to me," Betta said.

Fili agreed, but Kili moved to sit beside her and he looked at her arm with less concern that Fili thought proper.

"It will matter," Kili assured her. "A large scar would be more likely to give you pain, and it would limit the range of movement for your whole arm. See here, where the skin is folded? There is hardly a seam at all. Elm placed his stitches well." He nodded approvingly. "One of the old Dwarves down in the mines had caught his back upon a hook when he was young, but the skin was not laid flat before it was sewn down. He had a thick fold that would often catch the dust and sweat as he worked and it was always infected and giving him pain. Before he had reached his one hundredth year, he could no longer work and the healer was forced to reopen the wound and cut away a great deal of scarred flesh. It took away most of the pain, but he was not allowed back into the dust of the mines. He must spend his days sitting beside the fire, telling tales and watching over the young Dwarflings like an old woman…"

Betta stared at him in surprise, and he smiled sheepishly. "Not that there is anything wrong with the work of old women," he said, hoping that he had not offended her who would, with any luck, one day become one.

Betta smiled, but Fili was still staring at his brother. "Kili, where did you learn such a tale?" he asked, shaking his head though he was grateful for his brother's wise words that seemed to comfort their former guide when his own words did not.

Kili grinned and shook his finger at his brother. "I ask questions, Fili," he said. "I do not always pretend that I know everything, the way that _some_ Dwarves are wont to do."

Betta laughed at them both, and Fili finished tying the last bandage. "Well, I can only say again that Elm did a good job, and I am glad that he did," Fili said. He gently eased her arm into the seal-skin sleeve that protected the bandaging from the damp and then sat back to admire his work.

He moved to sit on the ground next to Betta and began feeding the few sticks they had left into their fire, wringing as much heat as he could from the embers. The moon had risen above the trees and the stars blinked down at them from among the tattered clouds. Kili went to Betta's saddle and retrieved her bow and quiver. He sat near to the fire, examining both bow and arrows for damage. They would be crossing the river tomorrow and she would not be using her bow anytime soon, so he took out a small jar of wax that he carried and spread a thin coating over the exposed wood to protect it from any unruly waves.

"Do not bother," Betta said. "That bow is no use to me now, unless it is for firewood."

But Kili kept on with his work as carefully as before. "It belonged to your father," he said, "and that is reason enough to take care of a thing."

She frowned but did not argue with him.

Fili did not argue, either. He knew that Betta could never shoot her bow again, but he also knew that Kili was the better Dwarf to speak to her, bowman to bow-woman, as it were.

He sighed and stretched out his legs, leaning back on his elbows. He wished that he was not surrounded by frowning Dwarves, that he might rest his head upon Betta's knee has he had done before when they were only three alone and surrounded by the wild lands. On that journey, though there had been hunger and cold and dangers aplenty, at least he had not been pressured to act the part of Thorin's Heir. The responsibility of his inheritance lay before him, waiting for him to return to his uncle's halls, and the weight of it seemed heavier on his shoulders now that he had had a taste of real freedom.

"What will you do now, Betta?" he asked suddenly, looking up at her.

She frowned and then she shrugged. "I suppose I will sit awhile and then I will sleep," she said, "what else?"

"No, not tonight; I mean, what will you do once we have reached the end of our journey? Nan's cabin lies outside the main roads, half a mile from town. Gilon has his own farm and a bit of a forge, too, though not so fine as those of the Dwarves. You will have a room there that is safer than any inn in town, and Kili and I will be able to visit you without attracting attention… but will you stay with Nan? You have not said for certain which way you will go. Can I trust that I will find you there again, after…?"

The word hung in the air longer than Fili liked. The only sound was the distant rumbling snores of the Dwarves, and the soft rustle of feathers as Kili fixed the fletching on Betta's arrows.

"Betta…"

"I will stay for awhile," she said, interrupting him. "Until my arm is healed and my strength returned, you will find me there. Longer than that, I cannot say. If I am to stay, then I must find work. I cannot always be relying on the charity of your friends."

"Work?" Fili said, sitting up. "What work would you do?"

Kili looked back and forth between them then lowered his eyes without comment. It was not yet needed for him to interfere in their fight. Besides, he wanted to hear this one.

"I will think of something," Betta said, not eager to see how offended Fili was by the idea of her earning her own bread. "I have known old women to sew with two hands so arthritic that they could hardly hold the needle. I might do as well as they with one good hand. I could take in mending and laundry, or the wife of the old innkeeper was kind to me and might be persuaded to hire me on as a servant. I will be slow at first, but my left arm will soon be twice as strong as any…"

"I will see no woman of mine serving beer in a Man's tavern!" Fili said angrily.

"Hush!" Kili hissed, looking toward the wagon. The brothers had the first watch and the other Dwarves had all by now gone to their rest, but there was no knowing whether some late-night listener would catch their words.

Fili swallowed his anger and clenched his fists. Betta shook her head. "But Fili, I am no woman of yours, not yet," she said quietly, "and perhaps not ever. I must make my living somehow, and I have nothing to trade but myself and my labor."

"Then trade your labor to Nan for your room and board. What else do you need?"

"What else do I need?" Betta said, growing angry herself. "You said once that you did not wish for me to live as your mistress, as your kept woman. Have you changed your mind since rejoining your kin that you now wish me to be reliant on you for all things? Or, do you think that, because I love you, I no longer have any use for my freedom and it must be given up?"

"Hush, now, both of you!" Kili whispered sharply. "Neither of you should be speaking this way. Not here! Anyway, there is no need for this argument. If Fili has forgotten, then I will remind him. Go get my sack over there. Show Betta her wedding present and then both of you may be satisfied, though I cannot think what will happen if Gloin should see what we carry."

Fili realized what his brother referred to, and he, too, looked toward the wagon. Not even their place as Thorin's heirs would save them if Gloin realized that the brothers were secreting gold through his camp. Fili was quiet as he retrieved the sack from Kili's things and set it before Betta, opening it to show her the small lumps of brassy stone.

"This is not…"

"It is," he assured her. "Do you doubt the word of a Dwarf?"

"No," she shook her head. "No, I do not." And she did not. It was not Fili or Kili's word that she doubted but her own eyes. The raw gold was not fair, not finely wrought into cups and crowns or even pressed into coin, but she recognized the metal and guessed that its value was great even in its natural form.

"Where did you get this?" she asked. "You said that you found no treasure."

"I will not speak of that here," Kili said, "but it was freely found. It is mine and I have decided to give it to you. And to Fili, of course, and if that will not stop you two arguing, then I might take it back as payment for all the trouble you have given me. It is a wedding gift, after all, and if there is no wedding, then there is no need for a gift."

Betta frowned and her hand felt suddenly shaky. "Whether or not there is a need remains to be seen," she said. "But I cannot take this. You have said over and over that you must have treasure to prove to your uncle that you are worth taking on his quest. Here, you have gold. You must give it to him, not to me."

"Ah, well…" Kili shifted anxiously in his seat. He glanced at his brother.

Fili, too, had often considered that uncomfortable question and all the lies that he must tell if he did indeed give the gold to Betta – Thorin would certainly ask what they had found in the northern hills. And yet, they might still give their uncle the much smaller treasure that they had found in the lost Naug-dwarf's chest. There were coins and raw gems there. And it was not as if Thorin would miss this small sack once he had liberated the treasury of Erebor from the tyranny of the dragon.

Betta saw the brothers' uncertainty. "It does not matter," she said. "This is a wonderful gift, Kili, but I cannot accept it. I can make no use of raw gold. It is not food or a room to live in. I can only trade it away to some other Dwarf in the hopes that he will pay me a fair price in real money." She shook her head and pushed the sack away. "No, I must work for myself. I am too proud to live on charity."

"It is not charity," Kili insisted, "but a gift from a friend. Of course we will find some way to turn it into coin or trade it for something that you can use. You need not worry over that…"

"And you need not work," Fili said.

"Alright," she said, too tired to argue, "then I will not _need_ to work, but I will _choose_ to work. I must keep my arm strong and my mind busy." She sighed and looked back at the gold. "At least, with this gift, it would be work of my own choosing…"

"Then I must be content with your choice," Fili said, smiling – he had not yet given up on convincing her otherwise. "Work if you must, but not too hard. You need rest and to heal, for there will be enough to do once I return from… from my next journey. We will have a life to build then, and that is no small labor." He took her hand in his.

"When you return…" Betta echoed. "_If_ you return…" Her fingers tightened around his hand, and she wished that she could hold him there and not let go. "And what do _you_ mean to do, Fili, once we return to your home? You may have many weeks or even months before your uncle leaves his Hall."

Fili looked away. "I do not think that it will be as long as that," he said. "We were long gone on our journey, and it is March already. I would not be surprised if he planned to leave before the month was out. He will not put it off later than the spring, if I know my uncle at all." He thought back to his conversation with Gloin and wished that he knew what messages Thorin had sent out to his kin. He thought also on what Thorin had said long ago regarding Tharkun, the Wizard, but that was less clear.

Fili looked across the fire at his brother, his little brother. Kili was tying the last feather to the last of Betta's arrows, focused on his task but still alert and listening to what was being said. They were going to face a dragon, Fili reminded himself. What if he did not return? Kili had promised to take care of Betta, but what if Kili did not return either?

"I would like for you to meet our uncle," Fili decided.

Two pairs of eyes turned to stare at him, but Kili's were the widest. "You cannot bring her into the mountain," he said.

"I can," Fili said. "I am Thorin's heir and as such it is my right to arrange for an audience between Thorin and delegations from the surrounding villages of Men. I can bring her inside, and what is more, I am determined to do it. I will not be shamed into silence. If Betta is to live in this land alone, then I will not have her be a stranger to all our people."

"Thorin will not like it."

"No, he will not," Fili agreed. "But I am not wholly a fool, Kili. When we are within sight of the town, you and I will turn aside and leave Betta with Nan. From there, we will continue on to the mountain where Thorin is most certainly expecting us." He smiled as his plan fell into place. "Yes. We will test the waters there, and when we are certain that our uncle is in a good mood and distracted by his quest, we will bring Betta in by some secret back door to a private room where…"

"No."

He looked at Betta in surprise. "What, no? You do not wish to meet Thorin?"

"Oh, I will meet him, and gladly. I have many things that I would say to your uncle, but I refuse to be slipped in by the back way. Once again, Fili, you treat me as if you are ashamed of me, as if I were your whore." Fili pulled away from her as if he had been slapped, but Betta had raised herself among Men harder than he, and she had heard many worse things said of her than that. "If you are not ashamed of me, then introduce me face to face and without deception, or do not introduce me at all. I have looked into the eyes of orcs and trolls and felt the teeth of Elm's bone-saw. I am not afraid of any Dwarf King."

Fili frowned and wished more than ever that Betta had been born a Dwarf-woman. If she had, not even proud Dis could have objected to calling her kin.

"This is your final word?" he asked. "You will not come secretly into the mountain? It would be safer for…"

"I will not. I will walk through the front gate or I will not enter at all."

Fili sighed. "Well, there it is, Kili," he said. "We must bring Betta in by the Gates. At least there is now no reason for delay. She will come with us into the mountain and when Thorin asks to see us, he must see her as well."

"And how will you explain her to the guards who will try to stop her?" Kili asked.

Fili shrugged. "I know the rules. I know them better than you, dear brother. Betta is a delegation of one. She comes from the southern coasts and has shared in our adventures, saving both our lives and losing her hand to a quest that was as much ours as it was her own. If Thorin had not refused us a place in his company, we would not have gone north."

Kili opened his mouth to protest, but he had no words to say and closed it again. "I suppose that is true," he conceded. "But even you, Fili, must know that Thorin does not trust the tall folk. You overestimate his capacity for patience where the other races are concerned."

Fili sighed. "At least she will be there as witness to our story. Without treasure, Thorin will think that we hid in the trees of Emyn Uial until it was time to come home. What better proof do we need of our adventures than the word of the woman who witnessed it all?"

"Gold would be better," Betta said. "More useful than I am."

Fili looked at her and saw her unease. "If you do not wish to go, I will not force you to do it," he said, softening his words and putting his hand over hers. "But we may have no other chance for you to meet our uncle, and I would have him know you. I would have every Dwarf in the mountain know you, but I would be content with only one."

Betta held his hand and met his eyes. "If you are determined, then I am determined," she said. "I am not ashamed."

Fili smiled and Kili sighed. He shook his head, but in his heart he was not surprised. "You two are made for each other," he said, "and I am sure we will all suffer for it."

Not long after, Kili went to the wagon and woke the next Dwarf for his turn at watch. Betta went to her bed knowing that in the morning they would cross the river and be that much closer to Ered Luin. As Fili had done, she thought of the thieves and the dead kitchen boy that they had discovered near the southern road. On this leg of their journey, the final few miles, the danger was not what would catch them upon the road but what was waiting for them at the end of it.

When she closed her eyes that night, Betta saw the shadowy figure of the great Thorin Oakenshield, the rumor that she had only heard second-hand from his nephews. He sat alone in his great halls, brooding on dragons and lost treasure, awaiting the return of his nephews from the wild lands and planning his revenge…

.

The land that lay about the feet of Ered Luin was still wrapped in the chill of winter's morning, but Balin felt the sweat beading under his heavy coat. Spring was on the way and the sun was bright in the pale, blue sky. His pony stumbled as it dragged its hooves up the uneven, snow-covered road to the Gates of Thorin's Halls. Balin pitied the poor beast that had been forced to carry him so far and so fast in the past few weeks, but his messages had all been delivered and in a few days, Thorin's kin – those who were not already within the Blue Mountains – would begin to arrive.

Balin reached the top of the sloping road, looking forward to a warm meal and a warm bed to sleep in, but the Gates were shut.

"What is this?" he said, speaking aloud in his surprise.

A Dwarf looked out from behind the wall. "Master Balin!" he said, quickly moving to unlock the gate. "I apologize. It has been so long since the Gates were closed at night that I sometimes forget to open them again in the morning." The Dwarf, Farn, if Balin remembered right, pulled back the gates and latched them to the stone walls.

"Indeed," Balin agreed, eyeing the deep divots in the snow where the Gates had been passed back and forth forming two mirrored arcs on either side of the road. "It has been thirty years! And before that… well, not since we first came to these hills and had yet to make friends with the town folk. What has gone wrong here? I heard no rumor of danger."

Farn shook his head. "No, no danger that I know of. Thorin ordered that the Gates be closed at nightfall and opened again at morning. That is all that I know, and it is my job, after all…"

Balin laughed. He could see what Farn thought of his "job". The Keeper of the Gates was a symbolic position at best, at least it had been. "Well, I will have a word with Thorin about it," he said as he rode past the Dwarf. "But we will keep word of your tardiness this morning to ourselves."

"I would appreciate it, Master Balin. Thank you!" Farn smiled and bowed many times as Balin rode up the hill to the main door, but Balin's own good mood was much lessened by this new information. Why would Thorin want the Gates closed? If there was no trouble in the town, what could be the reason? And, if there was no reason, locked Gates would send a very bad message to the tall folk down below.

When the Dwarves had first returned to Ered Luin, after the grievous victory of Azanulbizar, they had built their Gates and kept them locked, but the people of the town were friendly enough and eager to have the extra money that Dwarf traders brought in. The Gates were left open for nearly an hundred years after that, apart from the winter of 2911, when the bitter cold caused much hunger in the valley and many wolves roamed the hills. Thorin had been a young King at that time, but he had allowed the tall folk to build huts in the wide valley beneath the doors of his Halls and at night, those who were afraid might take shelter behind the walls and strong iron of the Gates…

But there was no bitter winter now, and the agreement between the mountain and the town was unbroken.

Balin shook his head, setting aside his thoughts until he had more information. He dismounted and led his tired pony to the small, stone-walled stable that was set just back from the main doors, sheltered behind many large stones. The lad who handled the horses ran out and took the reins from him with many words of greeting. Balin smiled and gave the lad a small toy that he'd brought from his uncle in Dunland, a small, carved dog with moving legs.

"Gar will be surprised to see how long your beard has grown, lad," Balin said, mussing the young Dwarf's hair.

"I will have your bags brought inside," the lad said, pocketing the toy with a grin.

Balin looked up at the sun. It was fully risen above the eastern line of hills, but the morning was still young. "I will bring them myself," he said. "I will have time to wait for Thorin. He must be hardly out of his bed…"

"I would be surprised to hear it, sir," the lad said, leading Balin's pony into the stable. "I have not seen him, but they say that Master Thorin hardly leaves his Great Hall these days. He is lost in maps and ancient scrolls, sending messengers in all directions. More than once, they have found him asleep at his table, and only Dwalin has been able to convince him to go to his rest."

"Surely Fili is looking after his uncle better than that."

The young Dwarf shook his head. "I cannot say. I have not seen Fili or Kili for many weeks. They rode east and no one seems to know where they've gone." With that, the young Dwarf went into the stalls to brush down Balin's pony.

Balin frowned as he looked up at the tall, narrow doors that led into the Dwarf-home. Fili and Kili were missing. Thorin was overworked and anxious, locking gates and neglecting his rest. Could it be that Thorin was more like his father and grandfather than any of them had been willing to believe? At least there was no sign that he had slipped off in the intervening months and gone on his quest alone.

These mountains may not be Erebor, but they were home… for now, and Balin had hoped that this homecoming would be a peaceful one, allowing him a few days' rest before the other Dwarves arrived and they began laying plans for the eastward journey. Now, he knew, that would not be the case. He must see to Thorin, immediately, and he must learn where were the missing Durin brothers. He could only hope that no danger had found them.

* * *

**Coming soon, what you've all been waiting for... THORIN!**

**Also, for those who have commented: in the previous chapter, Betta was reluctant to speak up not because she is weak but because she is more aware than either of the brothers that they are royalty and she is not. They are Dwarves and she is not. It is more of a class situation than a gender thing, though both do come into play.**

**Please Review.**

**-Paint**


	3. Trouble in the Halls of Ered Luin

Knowing the trouble that he must face, Balin was tempted to go first to his own rooms and rest his tired bones for an hour or two before he looked after Thorin, but, in the end, he knew that he could not rest until he had seen with his own eyes the state that his cousin was in.

There were few Dwarves at large among the passages of the Dwarfhome. Most had risen with the sun and were already at work down in the mines liberating the few useful ores that the Blue Mountains provided. The rest were with their own families in their own rooms. The few dwarves that Balin saw in the halls all told him the same thing, that Thorin Oakenshield would undoubtedly be found in the Great Hall, the long room where Thror's old, wooden chair sat gathering dust and where his grandson met with those traders and leaders of Men who came to his halls on official business.

But the Great Hall was empty. Thorin's honor guard was not at the door and there was no fire in the grate. The long table had been pushed to one side but the far end was laid thick with sheets of parchment, old maps and tall books of lore. Along one side, low mounds of many candle stubs were laid out like a mini mountain range, but the wicks were drowned and the wax was cold.

Not yet defeated, Balin pushed through to the narrow passage that let out behind the raised throne and walked down to the private library of the Durin line. Before the rickety door to that small room sat the single honor guard who was duty-bound to follow the head of the Durin household wherever, and whenever he went within the Dwarfhome of Ered Luin. Balin expected to find an old Dwarf – Fror, perhaps, or Tharn – it was usually some friend or favorite who was given the not very difficult task; it was a surprise to find Dwalin, his own brother, dozing beside the door and looking very out of place folded nearly in half to perch upon a low stool.

Smiling to himself, Balin was careful not to wake his brother as he opened the door and stepped into the library. He had seen the dark circles beneath Dwalin's eyes and guessed that his not-so-little brother had had his hands full minding their cousin's shifting moods in the weeks since Balin had left.

The private library of the Durin family was small and cramped, the air filled with smoke and the corners thick with dust and cobwebs. Until recently, the room had seen little use. There was housed all that remained of the lore of Erebor. Along the walls were stacked rolled up maps and scrolls, books of lore painstakingly rewritten from the memories of the dwarves who had survived the destruction of the mountain. Balin had known them all, the refugees of The Lonely Mountain, the old and the dead. They had been friends of his father, Fundin, and many stories of their lives lived on in his head.

The scrolls, Balin knew also, for he had read them all and knew intimately the scent of burning that still lingered in the fibers of the old parchment. How many dwarves had been at work that day, toiling over their books? How many had fled and died? How many had taken up the work that lay before them and run, clutching pages in their sweating hands while others reached for swords? Soldiers and scholars alike had burned and been devoured that day, and more died from the damp and hunger that came upon the refugees as they wandered in the wilderness.

Balin trailed his fingers over one of the dusty shelves and remembered many faces long forgotten. Ered LUin was safe and peaceful in the early morning hours, but Thorin meant to leave this place, to go back into the wilderlands, to return and face the dragon once more…

Balin sighed and looked up again. A small fire burned in the chimney to one side, and a wide, square table had been set nearby. Thorin lay before the fire, his head resting upon one arm while the candle at his elbow guttered in the breeze from the vents cut into the stone overhead. The wind had picked up outside, but within the mountain, all was warm and quiet. The light from the fire reflected in the sweat upon Thorin's fevered brow.

Balin frowned and was about to turn away, but Thorin was not asleep. He heard the scuff of boots upon the stone floor and looked up. For a moment, his face was blank and he looked at Balin as if he were a stranger.

"How quickly you forget me, cousin," Balin said softly. He smiled, but there was no eager twinkle in his eye, no joy at this reunion.

Thorin blinked at him a moment longer, clearing the sleep from his eyes. his cheeks were pale and drawn; the dark circles sunk under his eyes were even deeper and darker than those that painted Dwalin's face, but the shadow passed quickly and Thorin stood up. The smile that spread across his face at the sight of his old friend wiped away all sign of weariness and erased many lines of care.

"Balin! Cousin!" He hurried around the table and embraced his friend. "Forget you? No! Not though ten ages of the world were to pass before I saw you again, but we have much work to do and many plans to lay. The days grow long again…" He drew Balin back toward the table that was laid – if possible – twice as thick with pages as the long table in the Great Hall. There were more bound books here, stacked high and marked with ribbons in many places.

"Not so very long," Balin said, searching his cousin's haggard face. Dwarves were proud of their beards, but Thorin's was unkempt and untrimmed. By the smell, Balin guessed that he had not bathed for many days. "Not long enough that you could find a few hours for sleep? Thorin, when was the last time you lay in your own bed?"

"Already, you begin to scold me, my friend," Thorin laughed, "but there will be time for that later. These days, I cannot sleep. I must work while I wait on that dratted Tharkun! I had thought that he would have been here by now, been here many weeks ago, but Wizards will come and go as they please." He shook his head and pulled up a chair nearer to the fire for Balin who sat down gratefully. Thorin himself sat at the table again but he turned and leaned eagerly toward his cousin.

"Tell me now, what did you learn of the eastern lands? It is not easy to get reliable information out here regarding the lay of the wilderlands and the straight beyond Hithaeglir. As to the paths through the Greenwood…" He shook his head.

"Have you planned our road so far?" Balin said, looking down at the maps upon the table. "It is long since our family passed that way." Not since they fled west after the destruction of the dragon, he _did not_ choose to add, but Thorin's face was dark with the memory of dwarves lost, of his own mother who had died.

"Well," Thorin said finally. He turned back to his table and pushed aside one map while pulling forward another. "I have considered many roads that we might follow. Once the council has assembled, then we must decide which is ours to take and when…"

Balin frowned, but he knew that there was no getting Thorin's mind off of his quest, and no way to get him off to bed either, not yet. "I know more of the lands of our kin west of Hithaeglir than I do of the eastern lands," he said. "But there is some good news that I bring. I have convinced Gloin to come, at least to the council. Indeed, I am surprised that he is not already here."

"Gimli arrived many days ago," Thorin said. "It seems that our cousin has found some new profit up north that tempted him out of his way, but he will come. It is just as well. We will need ready money on the journey, as well as food and weapons, if we are to travel so far and in secret. Gloin is the only dwarf that I know whose purse is always full, and a dwarf like that is useful on any quest."

"If you can get him to open that purse, of course," Balin muttered. He had grown up alongside Gloin and Oin and held a very skeptical view of the work of merchant dwarves.

Thorin knew what he meant, and his face was grim. He leaned forward, resting his palms flat on the table with the maps between them. "Yes, your cousin is tight with his money, but better that I will be beholden to him than to one who is not my kin." He leaned back with a sigh and pinched the bridge of his nose between two fingers. "My father used to say that a King without a treasury of his own must be prepared to hold out his hands to merchants and miners alike. He must always be begging for his keep."

Balin did not like the sound of that, but before he could speak up, Thorin rose to his feet and struck the table with a thunderous blow. "Not for long!" he cried. "Not for long, and not forever!"

His voice was deep and raw from sleepless nights but the sound of his words echoed throughout the room and out into the hall.

"So," Balin said, once the echoes had died away and all that was left was the soft crackling of the burning wood upon the hearth. "So, it is a quest for gold that we have undertaken."

Thorin winced and turned toward his friend. He saw the deep lines of sorrow carved upon his cousin's weary face. He laid a hand on Balin's shoulder. "Not for gold only," he said gently. "Not only for gold but for our families also, for very Dwarf that has ever desired to once more look upon the stone halls of our forefathers. The dragon, Smaug, stole our home from us, but we will have vengeance. We will have our home back again. The beast has lain there far too long!"

Thorin's words kindled the anger in Balins's breast, but he smothered the growing flame and said, "There are many young dwarves here who would gladly call Ered Luin their home… if only you would let them. Fili and Kili have known no other mountains but these."

"Yes, my nephews," Thorin agreed and stood up straighter. His voice hardened with resolve. "They deserve better than these unfinished halls and uneven floors under their feet. You are right and I must think of them, also, and what will be their inheritance once their uncle has passed on to old age and un-use."

"You dismiss the aged too quickly, _old_ friend," Balin said.

Thorin smiled and sat down again. "Well, I have more news for you, Balin, that you will be glad to hear. Your messages have reached farther than you have guessed and I have had answers already. Dori and Ori have come up from the south; they arrived three days ago, and Nori will be here tomorrow. I expect, with more of their folk. Oin is still here, somewhere, probably with Fris and Gimli awaiting Gloin's arrival. Your brother, Dwalin, you saw outside, I dare say…" He winked and shook a finger at Balin. "Do not think that I do not know you left orders for him to look after me, but your brother is a terrible nursemaid and causes more hurts than he cures."

"Dwalin's skill is in fighting," Balin agreed. "His bedside manner leaves much to be desired."

"I have manners enough in bed," Dwalin said, pushing his wide shoulders into the room. Their loud voices had woken him and he was too eager to wait to greet his brother again. "But she who'd confirm it is not here to speak for me."

"Frei is well, then?" Balin asked, embracing his brother.

"Aye, and missing her husband who has been kept up nights looking after this bothersome Oakenshield," he aimed a sharp look at Thorin, but not as sharp as it might have been. "I'll leave our cousin to you, brother. I must have a proper rest if I am to get anything done today."

After a few more words, Dwalin left them. Balin watched his brother go, stumbling and wiping sleep from his eyes, and he sighed. He was not surprised that Dwalin had failed to keep their royal cousin in line. Though Balin had grown up with Thrain's son, Dwalin had known little of their cousin prior to the Battle of Azanulbizar when Thorin's brave deeds upon the field had won him renown and his proud title – as well as the eternal admiration of a very young Dwalin.

Balin had often thought that his little brother looked up to their cousin with a devotion that was more than a little too trusting and, perhaps, a little too forgiving.

No, Balin knew that he would have to be the reasonable one here, as usual, calming Thorin's eagerness and counseling caution in his ear. He turned back to Thorin who was once again ticking off names upon his fingers.

"Bombur and Bifur sent word from Bree that they will come, and they say that Bofur will join them upon the road… They will bring many dwarves with them, I know. Who is missing? Ah, yes. Gloin will take the northern road, but I expect him in the next few days. Gimli says that he had only one wagon with him, but there are Dwarves in the northern hills, and I have no doubt that he will find them and bring them around to our cause.

"That accounts for nearly all that I sent for by name, and a few others who answered, but I have high hopes that still more will come… I have been travelling while you were away, cousin." Thorin smiled. "Oh, not so far as you have gone, but I have been south to the harbors and east as far as the Shirefolk's farms, wandering in disguise. Something is afoot, but I cannot put my fingers on it. I feel as if the whole land is watching, waiting for us to set out."

He frowned and shook his head. "If only I could be more certain of the road," he muttered. "We must have wagons if more are to come, but if we have wagons it will be that much harder to travel in secret…"

Balin turned his face away. He did not share Thorin's hope of raising an army to their cause. There were few Dwarves these days who could be roused from their work, and those were more interested in earning their gold than winning it at such a high cost. Most were content to curse the dragon from afar. Thorin may have walked the hills beneath Ered Luin in recent days, but Balin had ridden over a hundred leagues over many weeks, and he knew that no other of their long-sundered kin would join them.

He looked up suddenly and looked around. "Where _are_ Fili and Kili?" he asked. "Have they gone to town so early this morning? Fili always seems to know when I am about, and I was surprised that he did not meet me at the Gates." Thinking of the Gates, Balin was about to ask why they had been ordered locked, but what Thorin said next drove the thought right out of his head.

"My nephews are off on some sort of _adventure_," Thorin said with a wink. He walked to one of the many shelves, took down another book and walked back to the table. "They met some human woman in town with an old map of Evendim, and she offered to pay them a few coins to take her around those hills. I almost kept them here, but they have been so much trouble lately. It has been much quieter in the mountains since they have been gone, and I have gotten a great deal of work done without Fili's frowns following me about the place and Kili getting into trouble every day…"

"To Evendim? But that is little more than a week's ride from here. When did they leave? And when will they return? Surely you want them here now that the others have begun to arrive?" Balin remembered the day that he had left and his conversation with Fili. He knew that the young Dwarf was determined to go to Erebor. Surely Fili would not have gone off, knowing that the quest was so near.

"It was not long ago," Thorin said, waving the questions away. "I have been busy with my own travel, but they have not been gone more than a few weeks or a month. Indeed, they left the same week that you left us, old friend, and you have not been gone long."

Balin stared at Thorin and wondered whether this madness were not more than a few sleepless nights. "Thorin! I have been gone _two months_!" he said sharply. "How long have you been locked up in this room that you do not realize your own nephews have been gone for _two months_!? Where are they? Why have they not sent word?"

Thorin looked up and almost smiled, thinking that his cousin was playing a joke on him. "It cannot have been so long as that," he said slowly.

"Long enough that I journeyed south as far as the mouth of the Isen. Long enough that I rode east and north into Dunland and stopped at every Dwarf-settlement along the way searching for the names on your list. I say that it has been two months, and two months it has been! Where are your nephews, Thorin?"

Thorin hesitated. Balin's concern was catching, but still, he shook his head. "They have been gone as long and longer when they rode the caravans with Dwalin and Gloin," he said. "Fili is a clever lad. He will look after his little brother."

Balin opened his mouth to protest, but Thorin held up a hand to silence him. "I do not doubt that they have indeed returned and slipped in while I was away. They have decided to play a trick on their old uncle and are hiding away somewhere, determined to worry me. Or, more likely, they failed to bring home the treasure that they promised and are locked up somewhere working out some new tactic against me. Fili wishes to go to Erebor, you know, and Kili will always follow his brother."

"I know what Fili wishes. I spoke to him before I left, but Thorin, how are you not worried? Even in Evendim, anything can happen. They might be trapped in a ravine or been eaten by bears! Why did Dwalin not speak up?"

"Your brother has been busy, too busy to nursemaid two wayward dwarves. If you are truly worried, we will start up a search, but I am sure that Fili and Kili are around here somewhere, either in the mountain or down in town, hanging about the alehouses. Come now, we shall summon old Fror. If any dwarf can find the lads, it will be him."

Thorin left his maps and walked to the door. "You will see, Balin. Fili would not let his brother get into any real trouble."

Balin wished that he could believe it. He had hoped that speaking with Thorin would quiet the fears in his heart, but instead he found only a newer and greater fear. Where were the brothers? How had they been gone for so long? Was Thorin now so deep in his thoughts of Erebor that he could forget his own nephews?

It was a dark business that he had walked into, Balin thought, as he followed along behind Thorin, and Dwalin would soon regret that he had allowed it all to go on for so long.

"Wait and see, Balin," Thorin said as they stepped out into the passage and left the smoky, musty library behind. "We will have this all sorted out in no time at all. Someone has played a poor prank on his uncle, and I expect to find Kili at the bottom of it."

.

Of course, Kili was not found, not at the bottom nor the top of anything. All day, the dwarves of Ered Luin searched the mountain halls. Not a corridor was left unexplored, not a closet door unopened. Even down into the mines, the messengers were sent to ask every dwarf-man, -woman and -child when was the last time they had seen either of Thorin's nephews.

Fili and Kili, even in their less adventurous days, had a way of getting into every crack and corner to cause trouble. Every old dwarf could tell of a time when one or both of the lads had gotten too far underfoot, but this time there were no tales to tell. No one had had seen Fili or Kili in more than two months. The last dwarf to see them was Fror who had sent them off with packs and ponies and Thorin's permission along with the human woman. The news from town was the same from the few Men who the Dwarves bothered to ask: no sign of either brother in two months.

Balin watched Thorin throughout the search and what he saw worried him more than the missing brothers. While others were looking for Fili and Kili, Thorin stuck to his maps, waving away all concern. It was not until the last of the searchers returned and his nephews were declared well and truly missing that Thorin's anger burst forth in a loud curse that echoed through the halls of Ered Luin.

Deep down, Balin suspected that Thorin was more angry with himself that he had allowed the brothers to go wandering without an escort, and that he had forgotten them for so long, but still, he would do nothing. Thorin admitted, in private, and to Balin only, that he had been too eager to get his nephews out of his hair, but it bothered him less that they were missing and more that they had chosen _this time_ to go missing when they knew that their uncle would need all his time and attention focused on the quest.

"They are here, somewhere," he continued to say, even as the day turned to dark outside and the lamps were lit within the Dwarfhome. "Or, at most, they are out in the hills waiting for someone to look for them."

"Then you must _look_, Thorin!" Balin insisted. "The others are arriving. Fili, at least, should be here for your first council…"

"Fili _will_ be here," Thorin said. "He will not miss this quest, even if he thinks that he will not be on it." Balin's gaze weighed heavily on his back, and he sighed. "Well, we cannot search the hills tonight; the moon is nearly gone. I will send riders out tomorrow, to the ferry and across the river toward Evendim. Will that satisfy you, cousin?"

"I suppose that it must," Balin said unhappily. He knew that no more would be done that day. Nori had arrived in the early evening and had walked into the bustle of the haphazard search. His luggage had been mislaid in the shuffle and much time had been lost getting that mess sorted out. Balin could only guess at the trouble he would be put to once Gloin arrived with his merchants and their goods. For now, Thorin was locked in council with his books of lore and it was left to Balin to greet their guests and make arrangements for their stay.

Thorin still expected a great multitude of guests, but their official council waited only upon the arrival of Gloin and his (not-many) wagons. Tomorrow, perhaps, but no later than the next day – wizard or no, Gloin or no – the real planning would begin for the reclaiming of Erebor. Balin was not looking forward to that first gathering when Thorin must finally be forced to count the number of dwarves who had heeded his call. He will have no choice but to accept that there would be no army and no war. No legions were rising to answer the call of a poor, exiled King.


	4. An Audience With The King

**Middle-earth, and all who dwell within it, belongs to Tolkien. I am grateful to him for growing this beautiful garden in which our imaginations can play. Please review!**

* * *

Fili sat upon his pony at the edge of a low rise. He looked down into the valley spread out below him, a shallow bowl with his home set on the far rim. Below it, the little town lay like a cluster of toy houses scattered by a child upon a patchwork quilt of farmers' fields, dirt brown or speckled white. The river swept far south of the road but from this high place, Fili could just make out the silver thread sparkling in the distance. The mid-day sun warmed his back and cast a long shadow before him but farther west heavy clouds hung over the Blue Mountains and moved slowly southwards upon a swift wind.

Ered Luin. Even from a distance, his sharp eyes made out the curve of the wall before the doors to his uncle's kingdom in exile, Fili's home almost as far back as he could remember.

Betta rode up beside him, her pony stopped just far enough back that he had to turn his head to see her. Her face was pale and anxious under the shadow of her hood. He could measure the length of her long illness in the sagging of her shoulders and the thinness of her cheeks, but she looked past him, past the fields and small town to the mountains beyond.

"You do not smile," she said. "Are you not glad to see your home again?"

In his heart, Fili admitted that he was not as glad as he ought to have been, but only to Betta would he allow his face to betray his true feelings. "It _is_ my home," he said, willing himself to be grateful at least for the good food and rest that he would find there. "It is my home, but I have been gone so long that it all looks new to me." He smiled at her.

"Your uncle will be glad to see you after so many weeks away," she said.

Fili nodded, but he was not sure. Certainly, Thorin would be glad that his nephews were not dead and buried under the northern snow, but Fili could not say whether it would be enough to overshadow his anger when he learned that they had travelled an hundred leagues farther than he had given them permission to go and been gone weeks longer than they said it would take. He could not say which scene he hoped to find when he entered the mountains: a worried uncle pulling out his beard over his missing nephews, or King Oakenshield presiding over a council of maps and loyal dwarves, planning the reclamation of a kingdom in spite of their absence.

Fili urged his pony around and put his back to the valley. He searched Betta's face, looking beneath the illness, the exhaustion and anxiety; he knew that she was glad to have the end of their road in sight. Hers had been a longer journey than theirs, and she had lost more than either of them.

"Are you still determined to meet Thorin?" he asked. "No one would think any less of you if you turned aside. We are near the road to Nan's cabin…"

"As little as your folk already think of me, they could think no less," she said angrily, but when she looked at Fili, her eyes softened, and she smiled. "If you are determined, then I am determined," she said, laughing.

Still, he hesitated and reached across the space between them to touch her hand. "You have nothing to prove to me," he told her.

"Not to you," she agreed and squeezed his hand. "Do not worry," she said. "It must go well for us. After all, how terrible can your uncle be if he has raised two such good-hearted nephews?"

With that, Betta turned her horse away and rode down the hill to the road where Kili waited for them. Gloin and his wagon had gone ahead, unwilling to wait for those who would tarry behind; once Ered Luin was within his sights, Gloin had urged his company on as fast as their ponies would carry them in his eagerness to see his family again.

Fili, Kili and Betta rode behind more slowly. Half a mile past the ridge, the road forked, and the right-hand path wound away up the side of the valley before it disappeared behind a copse of trees. That way, Fili had meant to go when he hoped to leave Betta with Nan and Gilon. There were other paths, more often used, that led up to the farm from town, but that meant many more eyes to see them pass by.

Now, there was no need for secrecy. He rode into the valley with Betta beside him and was determined not to be ashamed. There was no way to know what would be the result of introducing his new wife to his uncle. Although Thorin could be a kind-hearted and generous friend, he was also a proud and stubborn leader who guarded his folk with the ferocity of one of the great southern lions.

Fili looked around at the hills and trees that he had known since childhood. He looked at his brother and in Kili's eyes he saw the same anxious questions that he asked himself: How was Thorin, and would he be angry with them. Would they even find him at home?

.

Thorin had woken at dawn that day to look out from the narrow window of his room. From the other side, only a sharp-eyed eagle might guess that it was a window and not a narrow fissure in the irregular surface of the mountainside, but inside an elaborate frame and sill were sanded smooth and carved with Dwarven knots. Thorin leaned his hand against them as he watched the sun rise over the distant hills; yellow rays of morning light danced upon the lingering snow drifts, making them glitter like piles of fallen gold. He smiled as he thought of the loyal dwarves who would gather in his halls that evening to plan their next adventure, and then he turned away. There was work to do.

That morning, he sent out search parties, as he had promised Balin he would do, and as he watched them ride away, he admitted to himself that even he was worried. Fili and Kili had been gone longer than the two or three weeks that they had agreed to. Thorin had no doubt that they had ridden farther as well, past the low hills of Evendim and into woods east of them, no doubt, chasing their own adventure. While they had been gone, Thorin had almost made up his mind to take the lads to Erebor – how glorious it would be to reclaim the old kingdom with his sister-sons beside him! But perhaps they were too young.

At mid-day, however, his fears were laid to rest. Two of the search parties returned with news. First, that Tharkun had been seen lurking about the valley and town below. Why he had not come straight to the Dwarfhome as promised, Thorin could not say, but he knew that wizards were fickle creatures. They arrived exactly when they meant to and not a moment sooner. The second message was better news: Gloin and his wagon had been met upon the road and, coming up behind them, Fili and Kili with a human woman.

Back in his library again, thinking over the news, Thorin frowned. He had only Fror's word to go by that it must indeed be the same woman who had set out with the brothers (besides Fili and Kili, only Fror had seen her), but why would she still be around? Why had Fili not sent her off at once?

He shook his head and put the woman out of his mind. What did that matter? Gloin would reach the mountain in time to join the first gathering of Thorin's council, and now Fili would be there, too. Balin had worried all night for nothing, Thorin thought to himself. But if that were so, why was he still uneasy? There was a strange feeling in the air, a sense that not all was well under the mountains, and he did not like it. Too few dwarves had answered his call, and there had been no word yet from Dain.

Perhaps it was only the Wizard, he decided. Tharkun had a way about him. He was always prying into the business of other folk until you never knew whether the thoughts in your head were your own or the seeds he had planted. Had it been wise to confide in the Grey Wanderer that dark night in Bree months ago?

Wise or not, it was done.

His mind made up, Thorin left the small library. There was too much to do, a feast to prepare. Dwalin was back at his post as Honor Guard and stood at attention as soon as Thorin opened the door. He guessed that the muscle-bound warrior had been given an earful by his brother and that it was Balin who had ordered him to this task again instead of handing it off to one of the older dwarves.

"Your brother worries too much about me," Thorin said. "Today is a good day."

"Aye." Dwalin nodded, but his face was anxious as if he, too, felt something forbidding in the air.

"Yes," Thorin repeated, putting aside uncertainty. "A good day."

.

The year was yet young and the sun set early. The sky was growing dark in the late afternoon when Gloin's rickety wagon finally rolled up the steep slope to Ered Luin. The Gates stood open; his wagon creaked past and up the road onto the wide lawn that stretched between the mountain and the wall. His pony whinnied and shook its head, but the animals were as grateful as the dwarves themselves to be home and in sight of good food, good rest and a clean bed of straw – even if for one, that straw was stuffed into a thick mattress and for the other it was laid on the floor of a warm stall.

Gloin guided his company across the yard and dismounted near the stables. The other dwarves were quick to hand the reins of their ponies over to the stable-hands and to hurry up the stairs, through the doors and on into the mountain. All were eager to see their families again, but Gloin stayed behind to be sure that his wagon was led safely down the deep-cut road into the caverns beneath the halls of Ered Luin. Later, he would oversee the unloading of his goods and make sure that every plate and coin was delivered safely to his own rooms (and very spacious rooms they were, too, though his family was small). He was as eager as any of his company to see his wife and son again, but he waited long enough to ensure that his goods and ponies were well-looked after before he allowed his tired legs to climb the steps that led up to the front doors of the mountain.

At the top of the stairs, Gloin paused to look back. Fili and Kili were only just passing through the Gates and into the yard. Their human woman rode with them, and Gloin shook his head. He was third-cousin, once removed, to those lads, and that made them close kin, but he had rarely agreed with the goings-on of Thrain's branch of the Durin line. Something queer had been handed down through that family…

Gloin shrugged his shoulders and shook his head. He would keep his nose in his own business – which was doing quite well at the moment – and he would wait to hear what Thorin had to say. This business with Erebor, as dark as it was, must be settled first. The rest would sort itself out as it always did.

.

Fili rode up to the stables in time to see Gloin disappear though the doors into the mountain. He frowned after the dwarf, then dismounted and stood by, watching while Betta swung herself down from the saddle one-handed. Her movements were still hesitant and her balance not yet quite right, but she refused to let him help her. In any case, his fears proved unfounded as she landed solidly on her two feet. She was learning to adjust to the loss of her hand. There was a growing confidence in her movements that made him truly believe that she would one day be able to look after herself.

The stables were nearly filled up with Gloin's ponies and the half dozen other animals that belonged to the dwarves who had ridden long miles to be at Thorin's council. Even so, the stable-hands were prepared to take in three more. They were not prepared, however, to see a one-handed woman of the tall folk dismount and stand shoulder-to-shoulder with the heir of their lord as if she had every right to be there. More than one pair of eyes stopped to stare at Betta as she patted the nose of her quiet pony and bid it farewell after the long miles they had ridden together. The animal nuzzled her hand and then allowed itself to be led away.

"Well, I suppose that there's no sense in putting it off," Kili said, stepping up beside her. He had been careful to take down their baggage before any other dwarf could lay hands on it, and he handed Betta her old pack. Slung over his shoulder and half hidden under his cloak was the sack of raw gold that they had brought out of the northern hills.

Fili nodded, and he met Betta's eyes, smiling to reassure her. If they had been in any other place, he might have held her hand or touched her arm, but they were among Dwarves and any gesture of affection must wait until after they had spoken with Thorin. Rumor travelled quickly underground, and Fili knew that he must show his support through such words and looks as could not be held against him later on.

Fili and Kili climbed the stairs with Betta between them but two steps behind. She was firm in her resolve but her heart beat fast against her chest as she looked into the darkness beyond the great, gaping doors. As often as she had faced down Dwarves before, it had always been in open forges or the common rooms of inns that catered to many different folk. Never before had she entered so deeply into their own halls and been surrounded by the culture that she barely understood...

The darkness underground brought back cold memories of black tunnels and swift-flowing rivers. Betta felt adrift and stopped short before they reached the top of the stairs. She must have made some sound, both Fili and Kili turned to look at her, their faces wore identical expressions of concern.

Fili resisted the urge to catch hold of her arm. She did not seem in danger of falling or fainting, but she looked up at him with sudden earnestness. "What do I call him?" she demanded.

"Call who?" Fili looked to Kili, but his brother was equally confused.

"What do I call your uncle?" she asked. "Is he King? Is he Lord? What title do I use?"

Fili laughed with relief and opened his mouth to answer but the words stopped in his throat. What title _should_ Betta give to her future uncle-in-law who was also the one dwarf in Ered Luin who could order her death against Fili's own wishes? Thorin rarely called himself King as his father and grandfather had done before him, and the delegations from town were made up of so many rag-tag groups of shop-keepers, farmers and traders that they neither gave nor received any titles on the rare occasion that they came into the mountain to do business. Most negotiations were carried out through intermediaries upon the lawn within the Gates.

From a young age, Fili had been trained in his role as heir and prince, but all his learning left him now. How was a human woman without rank or property to address a Dwarf King when she arrived to claim his heir for her husband? This was a question that had never come up in any of his lessons; understandably, as the writers of ancient Dwarf etiquette had never imagined such an occasion would ever take place. Betta looked to Fili for an answer, but it was Kili who spoke up and saved them.

"I would recommend that you call him 'sir'," he told Betta, smiling. "It is what I call him when I know that I am in trouble, and I think it will do just as well for you."

She nodded, breathing a sigh of relief, and Fili did, too, grateful not for the first time that his brother had such a deep well of good sense within him.

They ascended the stairs and reached the front doors that had been flung wide for Gloin and his company. A handful of well-dressed guards stood ready to receive the two princes returned from their long journey.

Upon seeing the brothers, a polite murmur of Dwarvish language welcomed them home. Even within their mountain, the Dwarves of Ered Luin most often spoke in the common tongue, but words of welcome were formal and, though Betta did not know the language, she recognized the joy that the dwarven guard felt at the safe return of their lord's nephews.

"Your uncle has spent the better part of two days searching for you," one dwarf, the Captain of the Guard, who wore an iron belt with a single gold link about his waist, said to Fili as he moved to pass by. "He has had the whole mountain up in arms, overturning every stone."

Fili nodded, acknowledging the words with an indistinct grunt. He was eager to get into the mountain and away from the guards before they spied Betta, but Kili was in front of him and he had stopped short at the Captain's words. "Only two days?" he said. "But we have been gone two months. What has Thorin been doing that he did not miss us sooner?"

Impatient, Fili nudged his brother's boot with his toe, but Kili only frowned at him, not understanding.

"Well, it is more than I can say…" the Captain said. It was not his place to pass gossip regarding the royal family, even among the family itself, but it did not matter. Fili might easily have guessed what the dwarf would have said, if he had had a mind to say it.

"Go on, Kili." Fili nudged his brother again. "We will see what is up for ourselves soon enough." With a pointed look, he finally made his brother understand his purpose, but too late. Before either of them could take a step, the Captain looked over Fili's shoulder and saw Betta.

She would have been difficult to miss if he had not been distracted by the long-hoped for return of the brothers. Equal to Fili in height, Betta was taller than nearly every other dwarf in Ered Luin and, as low as she ducked her head, she could not hide her smooth face and small features from them.

"What is this?" the Captain demanded, putting his hand on his axe hilt. "If that is a dwarf-maid, then I am an elf-brat. She should not be here!" The guards around them drew their weapons and the Captain would have driven her off with the flat of his axe if Fili had not stood between them.

"She _should_ be here, for I have brought her here with me," he said.

"And me, too," Kili added, though he stood in the doorway and had no easy way to come between Betta and the blade.

"Norin, isn't it?" Fili said, looking at the Captain more carefully. "This woman has suffered much and is worthy of better treatment from you. She saved my life in the northern hills, and I bring her here to meet my uncle. He will be impatient to reward her for her service to his nephews. Now, quickly, tell me where is Thorin?"

Norin looked back and forth between the two brothers, then up a few inches to Betta's pale face. She was taller than him but could not have frightened even a small Hobbit child with her looks. Anyone could see that she was no threat. Her face still bore the mark of long illness and the sling that bound her injured arm was tied across her chest, displaying the blunt end of her broken right arm for all to see. She was _in_ more danger than a danger to them, and she knew it. Not until she had seen the three dwarves reach suddenly for their weapons had she realized how precariously was her place among them.

Norin wavered between his duty to Thorin and his loyalty to the two brothers. He knew that, officially, Fili had the right to bring whomsoever he chose into the halls of Ered Luin, but that right had never been tested. There had never been any need to test it.

"Still," Norin said, "I should send word ahead…"

"Then send it with me," Fili said, growing angry. "I mean to go straight to my uncle, and no other messenger will arrive more swiftly than myself. I will be responsible for her, and I vouch safe that she is no spy. Now, tell me, where is Thorin? Tell me, or command one of these dwarves in your service to lead me and my brother to him. Our guest may be a surprise to you, but we, at least, are expected."

The guards shifted uncomfortably in their heavy boots. There were few who could stand up to Fili when he was determined, and none but Thorin could stand before his rage. Norin did not protest again.

"Every dwarf in the mountain knows where to find Master Thorin," he said. He gave orders for the remaining guards to return to their duties, then he bowed and gestured for Fili to enter with him through the front doors. Betta followed them, and Kili walked beside her.

"He is in the Great Hall," Norin went on as they walked down the dimly lit passage. "He has hardly left that room for many weeks. Master Gloin has just returned from his trade and he has gone to meet with your uncle. There are a few others as well. They are sitting down to dinner, I believe…"

"Then we shall follow their example," Kili said. He was relieved to see that no other dwarven guard followed them. The sack of gold was heavy under his arm, but he did his best to carry it as if it weighed nothing at all, and he hoped that no questions would be asked about it.

Betta had to hurry to keep up with the three of them. Though their legs were short, the dwarves travelled at a swift pace when they were sure of their footing. The main road through Ered Luin was wide and its vaulted ceiling swept high overhead, but the small torches on the walls did little to light the darkness. She walked quickly and kept her eyes on Fili's back. He walked with Norin and did not dare to look back at her for fear that her anxious eyes would cause him to doubt. They were in it now.

Few dwarves lingered in the passages between the front door and the entrance to the Great Hall. Whether they were all busy at other tasks or whether word had spread of his unexpected guest, Fili could not say and did not care. The fewer eyes that saw Betta, the better.

But he wondered, who were the other dwarves that Norin had mentioned? Probably Balin and Dwalin, perhaps Gimli, too. If Thorin were at home, then the quest had not yet begun. It was not too late to convince his uncle to take him and Kili along.

The doors to the Great Hall were shut but through them, Fili heard the murmur of voices. Norin hesitated once more. "Perhaps it would be best if she were to return another day…" he suggested.

"It would be best if you would announce us as I have asked you to do," Fili said. He doubted whether his courage would last another day. A wiser dwarf would have turned back, but Fili had always been more stubborn than wise, and he was as eager to see his uncle again as to have the meeting over and done with.

"As you wish," Norin said, unhappily, and he reached out to pushed open the doors.

A rush of familiar sounds and smells swept out to greet them as Fili took in the roaring fire and long, stone table piled high with food and jugs of ale. At least two dozen dwarves were there, sitting and standing, all speaking together. It was too early in the feast for song, but that would come soon, once the food had settled in their bellies and the ale into their blood. Kili laughed out loud and dropped his sack near the door, forgetting it and everything else as he hurried forward to throw an arm about his friend Gimli. It was only Betta's presence that kept Fili from losing himself in the crowd of well-known faces that all turned to them. There was no need for Norin to call out their names. A loud cheer went up and many voices called out to them, a wild noise of greetings. Balin was the first to come forward. He put a hand on Fili's shoulder and looked over at Kili with a smile.

"You do not know how much I have worried…" he began, but before Fili could feel guilty for causing the old dwarf any fear, Thorin was striding down from the head of the table, laughing and calling out, "There! Did I not tell you, Balin? There is no trouble so deep that these lads could not get themselves out of it!"

"Indeed, you said so," Balin agreed, stepping aside to give Thorin room to embrace his nephews. He did not sound very approving but then his eyes passed over the lads and saw the huddled creature who stood behind them.

"Who is this?" he asked. "Have you brought home a friend, lads?"

Balin's words were kind, and he would have willingly shown all the appropriate hospitalities to any Man, Elf or Dwarf that either Durin brother brought home, but he knew that Thorin would not be so welcoming. Now was not the time to try his patience, either, or confront his prejudices. The brothers did not know the state their uncle was in.

Until that moment, Thorin's eyes had been only for his nephews, their dirty faces and unkempt beards, but he heard Balin and looked past them and so did the other dwarves behind him. Only Gimli had been too busy rehashing old jokes with Kili to notice or hear what was said. Gloin stepped up to them and removed his son from under Kili's arm. He ushered Gimli out of the Hall, hushing his questions and blocking any sight of Betta with his body. He had no intention of allowing one of the tall folk – or the foolishness of the brothers – to corrupt his young son.

Several others of the dwarves had the same idea. Slowly, many of them slipped away, leaving the Hall or moving to far corners where they stood by themselves and cast dark, suspicious glances at the stranger. The Hall that had previously been filled with the laughter of many voices fell silent, leaving only the crackling of the fire in the grate and the pounding of his heart to echo in Fili's ears. He felt a slow dread growing in his belly as he watched his uncle's eyes narrow in on the human woman who had invaded his kingdom.

"Uncle, if I may introduce…" he began, but got no farther. Thorin did not hear him.

"Tell me that I am deceived, Fili," he said with anger smoldering in his dark eyes. "Tell me that you have not brought one of the tall folk here. Not now. No nephew of mine would be such a fool."

"Betta is our friend, she has…"

"You make friends with the tall folk!" Thorin sneered at her. "Their race is weak and deceitful. They are scheming creatures, disloyal even to their own kin who they rarely count beyond their father's father. What in Durin's name has gotten into that thick skull of yours!? Why would you…?" And then suddenly his anger cleared and he looked at Betta with new eyes. "Betta is her name, you say? Ah, I see it now. This is your treasure-hunter, the woman who paid you to take her into the hills. Well, I hope she has gotten her money's worth. How much gold did you bring back to us, lads?"

"We, ah…" Fili glanced at his brother and Kili hung his head. They had a sack of gold, certainly, but it was not theirs to give up. The lesser treasure from old Grahn was among the baggage that the stable hands had carried to the brothers' rooms. Fili wished that he had remembered to bring it with him.

But Thorin was not waiting for an answer. "You brought back nothing, and it is no more than I expected. This has always been a joke to you. You think the eastern road will be a pleasant escape from your duties at home? Our quest means so little that you would bring a stranger into our halls to hear our plans and carry them away to waiting ears! What has she seen? Who might she tell? Did you even think about what you were doing?"

He shook his head at them. "We have many enemies who would be eager to know what she has heard. I cannot allow your _friend_ to carry tales out of these halls. You brought her here, Fili, and here she shall stay. " He gestured to the guards that stood near the door. "Take her down below. I have no time now to deal with her. I have no time for these games!"

Norin glanced at Fili, helpless to refuse his lord's direct order.

"You would imprison the woman who saved your nephews' lives?" Fili asked, putting out his arm before the guards could take hold of Betta. "She is a stranger to you, but not to us, and we might explain if only you would only listen, uncle!"

Thorin frowned and looked back and forth between his nephews and the pale-faced woman. He shook his head. "That is not true. That two strong Dwarves would need a one-armed woman to…"

"She did not always have one arm," Kili said quietly, and not for the first time was he forced to wield this weapon in defense of Betta's honor. "She lost it saving me, uncle, and it nearly killed her."

Thorin stared at him, and then at Fili. Two months ago, before the trials of their long journey, neither brother would have stood so long in the face of his anger or defied his will so openly. They would have retreated to their rooms to regroup and try a new course another day. Not now. Both brothers stood before him, side-by-side and firm in their purpose. Thorin looked at them in amazement and was, for a rare moment, unsure of himself.

By now, nearly all of the other dwarves – even those who had at first drawn back into the shadows – had left the Hall. Thorin looked around and saw that only Balin and Dwalin, old Fror, Norin and his guards remained. He turned his eyes on Betta once more.

"Is this true, woman?" he demanded. "Did you rescue these two reckless and impudent fools?"

Fili moved aside so that Betta might be seen. Whatever his physical height, Thorin Oakenshield was an imposing figure, and she would rather Fili had stayed where he was. She wished for a whole wall of Dwarves between her and his uncle's anger.

"I should not have come here," she said, without thinking.

"No, you should not," Thorin said. "But you are here now, and your answer will decide whether you die in my dungeons or live to see the sun again. Did you, at any time in your travels, save the lives of either of my two sister-sons?" His cheeks were red with anger and his hands clenched into fists. If she lied, or if he thought she lied, Betta had no doubt that he could kill her with a single blow of one hand.

"I did," she admitted. "Though I saved Fili only once, and he had rescued me before…"

She glanced at Fili, and he smiled, remembering the frozen grove beneath the cornerstone of Ankor. "You saved me more than once," he told her.

She smiled and shook her head, but Thorin scowled. "This is how you repay me?" he shouted, turning on Fili again. "I agree to your hopeless treasure hunt, and you bring back some beardless woman to whom you now owe your life in debt!? And you put your brother in danger, too! From Kili I would expect such things, but you, Fili! I thought that I could trust you to be safe."

He sighed. "Almost I had made up my mind to take you east with me, but now I see that you are not ready. You are still too young for so much responsibility."

"No, uncle!" Kili cried. "We have proven our courage in the north. We fought wolves and orcs! A snow-troll nearly boiled us for his soup!"

"Tall tales, and nothing more," Thorin said with a wave of his hand.

"No, it is true," Betta insisted. She might have stayed silent for any insults thrown at her, but she could not bear to hear Fili and Kili's efforts demeaned. "All that he says is true, sir. I swear, by my right hand."

Thorin frowned and looked back at her, at her maimed arm. Even he could not easily dismiss the oath she gave. "And where is this hand for you to swear upon?" he asked, his words full of scorn.

Betta glanced at Fili who looked to his brother. "We will tell you, uncle," Kili said, "if you will only hold back your judgment until the end. And then see whether you believe…"

"Speak now, and quickly," Thorin said, sitting down at the near end of the table.

Even Betta was invited to sit with them, though the dwarf who brought mugs for the brothers and filled them with ale brought nothing for her. It was Kili who insisted that she be given drink as well, and he asked for plates, also, refusing to let his brother speak a word of their story until it was done. Betta would rather have been ignored. She understood better why both brothers had always seemed so cautious when speaking of their uncle. The weight of his stern gaze alone was crushing.

Eventually, a mug was found for Betta. The cup was half-full of plain water, but she would have been grateful for even a mouthful of sour beer to wet her dry throat. There was no plate for her; she could not have swallowed a bite of food, and the brothers, though served a heaping plateful of meat and bread, barely touched their meal.

Finally, Fili began their tale. He started at the inn with the thieves that had attacked them, and described the road and the bodies they found. Skipping over much of their journey, he told of the orcs that ambushed them beneath the birch trees of Evendim, the snow-storm that caught them unawares, and the sorcerous pack of wolves that seemed to double for every one that was killed. He was speaking quickly, but stopped to linger over that battle and described with deliberate care all that Betta had done in spite of her orc-wounded arm. Especially, he told of the flight of her arrow that had killed the lead wolf and saved Kili from being devoured.

Thorin listened, expressionless, but Dwalin frowned and Balin patted his brow with his handkerchief, looking as if he were living the tale himself and did not already know the ending.

After the wolves, Fili skipped ahead, leaving out Harandir's visit and touching only briefly upon the long walk they had taken through the snow and the cold hunger of the Secret Road. He left out, of course, his own growing feelings for their guide and hoped that there would one day be a better time to admit that he had pledged himself to her upon that road.

Fili's tale had reached the high hills, and a blanket of mist covered his memories there. He would not say what he had seen upon the nightmare hillscape, and he had been unconscious during the battle with the snow-troll. Kili picked up the thread of their tale and did his best to do justice to Betta's desperate plan. He told how she had scaled the heights of the beast's high hall only to be flung down again, how she had held onto her wits long enough to distract their enemy, buying time for Kili to drag himself through the snow to recovered his sword.

It was an anxious tale that kept their audience rapt, but Betta had both lived and listened to it told before. She looked around at the dwarves. The large, grim warrior across from her Kili had named – in a whisper while they waited for their drinks to be poured – that was his cousin Dwalin. The other beside him appeared much older; his bright eyes were anxious, but he smiled as he listened to the bravery of the brothers: Balin, Betta guessed, and she was right. Thorin she knew, and did not look at him. His hand lay on the table, no longer clenched into a fist, but she knew that he had not forgotten his anger nor forgiven her yet.

The smell of tobacco reached her nose, and she looked around for the source. None of the dwarves at the table were smoking, nor were any of the guards who stood at attention near the door. She followed the thin, grey tendrils back to a far corner and there, seated on a bench nearly hidden away from the firelight, was another dwarf with a long, iron pipe.

Betta stared at him and could not decide what it was about this hidden dwarf that seemed so strange to her. Kili finished his description of the death of the snow-troll, and Fili took up the tale again of their long walk through the tunnels under Angmar. It was not long before Betta's attention was drawn back to the table, and she was called upon to tell what she had seen when the orcs from Carn Dum had attacked the brothers in the deep, river room. Fili and Kili had been too busy fighting to say for certain what had gone on around them and, after they found her again with the Lossoth, Betta had refused to speak of the battle or of her suffering after the river took her.

She told them now, because Thorin demanded it. She knew which orcs she had killed and where her arrows had struck. That had been her chief concern at the time. She spoke slowly, and her words were firm until she reached the moment when the fleeing orc had struck her and she had fallen into the river. Almost, she could feel Kili's fingers still wrapped tight about her right hand; he had held onto her and looked down at her. There had been no doubt in his eyes that he would be able to pull her up again, but Betta had known better.

"I saw the orc was behind him and knew that he could not defend himself while he still held onto me," she said, staring down at the table. She could feel their eyes upon her and on her mutilated arm. "I let go," she said, "because he would not let go, and I was swept away into darkness. I saw nothing more. I thought we all had been killed."

Kili put his hand on her shoulder, but one look from Thorin and he took it back again. Fili finished the tale quickly: more long, dark tunnels; a hidden door; and the Lossoth hunters who had saved them from starving, and who had drawn Betta, half-dead, from the river, healing her though they could not save her hand.

By this time, Gloin had slipped back into the Great Hall without his son and he heard the end of their tale. He reluctantly admitted that he had found the brothers in exactly the state they described, sheltered among the Lossoth, safe and well-fed. Nothing that he had heard – as little as it was – differed from what he had seen.

Their tale now told, Fili fell silent; hidden under the table, he held Betta's hand and waited for his uncle to speak.

"What you say holds the ring of truth," Thorin said after a long, thoughtful pause, "if only for the true foolishness that you have shown getting into such dangers." He nodded. "Yes, I believe that this woman saved your lives and I am in debt to her, as are you both. Though I think that Fili has the lesser debt owed…" He sat in silent for some time.

"And yet, you were wrong to bring this woman here," he said. "She must still be taken away."

"Thorin, no!" Kili cried, rising to his feet, but Thorin held up his hand.

"I did not say that she would be sent to prison or held against her will. No, but she must leave these halls. I will order a guard to take her into town. The sun has set by now, but it is a short walk and the inn will be open…"

"After all she has done, you would send her away?" Fili demanded. "Where can she go alone?"

"That is not my concern. She does not belong here," Thorin said. His look made it clear that he would brook no argument from either nephew. "Do not think that I am not grateful for the aid that she has rendered you. She will be generously paid for her service to our family. After we have profited from our future journey, there will be money enough to repay _all_ debts. But for now, the town is where she belongs. If she thinks herself wronged, she may press her claim for recompense from there."

He stood up and summoned Norin forward. "See that this woman leaves our halls in peace, and have one of your dwarves escort her safely to town…"

"She has no friends in town," Kili said. Betta had no money for a room at the inn, either, and no means to earn any while she was still weak.

Thorin did not know this, nor would he have cared. He saw his nephews disappointed faces and scoffed. "Then let her go to wherever she might have friends," he said. "You did not think that I would house her here? Within these halls, among Dwarves?"

"I thought that she might find a place with Nan…" Fili said, and braced himself for his uncle's anger.

Thorin frowned at him without understanding and then slowly, like the last piece of a puzzle finally being laid in its place, he saw what he had missed before. He saw how close Fili sat beside Betta, and why his right hand did not rest upon the table with his left. He recognized the looks that had passed between them. His face hardened and his eyes narrowed.

Fili expected anger, but Thorin said quietly. "Do you mean what you say, that this woman's place is… that place?" he asked, willing it not to be so. "Think hard on your answer, Fili."

"I have thought on it for many weeks," Fili said. "She belongs with Nan."

The hammer fell, and even Kili felt shocked, though he had been prepared for it. Thorin turned his back on Fili and said to Norin, "Take the woman out of my Halls. Lead her into town, if she will go that way. If not, then leave her at the Gates and lock them tight behind her."

"Thorin!" Kili protested.

"_No_! That is my final word. I will pay what is owed for your life, Kili, in my own good time. I cannot refuse that debt. But for the rest," he turned his cold eyes on Fili, "she has already taken from me a price that I never would have agreed to pay."

With that, Thorin turned and left the Great Hall. Dwalin hurried after him, still bound to his duty as Honor Guard, but the rest stayed behind. Norin frowned and did not understand what had changed at the end, but he knew his orders.

"I am sorry, Master Fili, I must do as your uncle commands." He gestured with as much respect as he could muster for Betta to follow him out of the hall.

Fili did not dare insist that he would take her himself. Thorin might have left them, but old Fror was listening and would certainly carry to his uncle's ears everything that was said. "Will you take her to Nan?" Fili begged Norin. "I know what Thorin said, but…"

The Captain shook his head. "I cannot, but I will tell her the way."

"Those paths are difficult even in daylight," Balin said. He understood why Thorin would be angry; indeed, he was more than a little angry himself, but he felt more deeply what they owed to this woman. Without her, Fili and Kili would both have been devoured many times over. "And I am needed here…"

"But I am not," a voice spoke up from the corner. Everyone turned to look, and Betta saw the dwarf that she had noticed before stand and approach the fire. As he stepped into the light, Betta realized what it was that she had thought strange before. The dwarf's face and body was much smaller than the others, his hair longer and brighter in the firelight. His clothes were different, in the same way that the clothes of the Easterlings and the Haradrim differed from the clothing of the Men of Gondor, but also because he wore a shawl tied about his waist as long as a skirt though there were trousers beneath it. No, this was not a 'he', she realized. Here was a dwarf-woman!

Betta more looked closely at her as she approached them, curious to see what manner of female form Fili was used to admiring.

The dwarf-woman's skin was a fair shade of deep golden-brown that reminded Betta of the bodies of the Easterling women. Her hair was straight and black as coal, braided with gold and turqois and garnet beads but the fine strands of the beard were curled and unadorned. Her almond eyes were painted with black coal in a way that reminded Betta once more of the eastern peoples. She knew that culture only by what tales were told among refugees and descendants of ancient tradesmen, but whether this dwarf-woman came from the east or only copied their look, she was certainly not native to Fili's folk.

Though Betta did not know it yet, she was staring, gape-mouthed like a child, at Frei the Falcon's Steel of the Blacklocks, who had fought upon the fields of Azanulbizar and after the battle, Dwalin, Fundin's son, had pledged his heart to her. Many years would pass before Frei came back over the mountains and Dwalin was able to fulfill his oath, but she lived with him now in the Dwarfhome of Ered Luin far away from the land of her birth.

Frei was shorter than most dwarf-men, but her limbs were strong and straight. She strode up to the guards and even looked Fili in the eye. "I will take her to Nan's cabin," she said. "I have long meant to visit my sister there and now, it seems, I have much news to bring." Frei turned to Norin. "This woman needs no guard. I will see that she leaves the mountain."

The Captain shrugged. "I must see her to the Gates, as ordered, and have them locked, but I will tell the dwarf there to open them again for you when you return."

"I should hope so," Frei said. "I have no intention of begging shelter from the tall folk down below."

The other dwarves – save Balin, who was well-acquainted with the ways of his brother's wife – looked uncomfortably down at their feet, as if what she said that broke all bounds of propriety. Betta remembered Kili saying something about dwarf-women seldom leaving their mountain homes, but she knew already that Frei was no common dwarf.

"Come with me now, girl," she said, taking Betta by the arm. "Count yourself lucky and do not argue with me."

Betta had no intention of arguing with anyone. She only wished that she could have a word with Fili alone to say her farewells, but that was impossible. He smiled and nodded to her with more hope than he felt.

"There are things that I must do here, but I will come and visit you in a day or two when my uncle's anger has cooled. You have all your things? Your pack and your bow?"

"The bow was tied to Kili's saddle," Betta said, "but he may keep it in memory of the woman who once had the strength to use it."

Fili frowned as he watched the two women walk out of the Hall with Norin hurrying up behind them, and then he looked around for Kili, but his brother had slipped away. Kili had no need for sad goodbyes; he had every intention of seeing Betta again so long as she stayed with Nan. Thorin's talk of treasure had reminded him of the sack that he had carried into the Hall, and as soon as it was safe to do so, he took it up and took it out again. He must hide it somewhere safe, he knew, until he and his brother could fashion it or trade it in for coin.

Making his way quietly up the empty passage, Kili no longer regretted hiding this small treasure from Thorin. His uncle's anger was great enough that he may well forget his promise and refuse to pay Betta what honor required. She may not be going to the dungeons, but out in the wide world she would need all the help Kili could give her.

* * *

**It really is taking much longer to get these chapters out than I thought, so sorry for that, but I do hope to finish the story before BoFA come out (cross your fingers!)**

**Hope you like. Please REVIEW!**

**-Paint**


	5. Nan's House

**Middle-earth, and all who dwell within it, belongs to Tolkien. I am grateful to him for growing this beautiful garden in which our imaginations can play. Please review!**

* * *

Though Betta's last journey had been long and dangerous, at least she had been in the company of friends. Fili and Kili were behind her now, and she felt the loss in her heart as surely as she felt the lingering pain in her arm as she followed Frei out of the Great Hall.

Most of the lamps in the passages of the Dwarfhome had been put out, but the halls were not as empty as they had been the last time she passed this way. In dark corners and peering out of doorways, she saw dozens of Dwarf faces looking at her. Word had travelled fast underground and many of Thorin's folk had arrived to cast their disapproving glares upon the human woman who had dared to infiltrate their mountain. Frei's hand was wrapped firmly about Betta's arm; to restrain her or to protect her, Betta did not know. The dwarf-woman's silent scowl stifled any insults they might otherwise have thrown at her.

She was used to being stared at, and it was almost a comfort to know that the Dwarves stared at her face and scorned her for her race. The Men of the Caravan had stared at her arm, and no Dwarf's frown could have silenced the things that they said.

Too soon, Frei reached the front door with Betta in tow. The guards were still there, and to a one they looked astonished to see the human again. Undoubtedly, they believed that she would be in the dungeons by now. They were even more surprised, if it were possible, when they heard that Frei meant to leave the Dwarfhome and walk abroad alone with Betta.

The sun had set while they were in the mountain, and the hills outside were dark and full of shadow. The moon showed a thin sliver of his face through the clouds and, after the stifling halls inside, Betta gratefully turned her face to the lanterns above and welcomed the wide-open sky. Norin walked with the women across the lawn and up to the Gates where the old gatekeeper sat on his stool, nursing a mug of beer. Like all the rest, the gatekeeper stared openly at Betta's face, and he shook his head when Frei said she would go out, but he was an old Dwarf and had seen enough of the world not to be surprised by anything.

Norin stayed just long enough to see Betta step outside the Gates, then he bid Frei and turned to go, but she stopped him.

"Stand over there, girl, and wait for me, won't you?" Frei said to Betta. It was not a question, and Betta did as she was told, standing near to the patch of ground where she had once crouched to watch the sunrise while waiting for Fili to arrive. That had been months ago, but it felt like yesterday.

Norin also waited as Frei had ordered. There seemed to be no easy way to disobey the stern dwarf-woman. She was as hard and unyielding as the stone she lived under, and her coal-lined eyes seemed fashioned for anger.

From where she stood, Betta could not make out all that was said, but she heard the name Dwalin and as she looked through the iron bars of the Gate, she saw Norin blanch and nod meekly many times at whatever it was that the small dwarf-woman was ordering him to do. Eventually, he bowed and Frei bid him go. He went quickly, hurrying up the stairs and back into the mountain.

Frei nodded to the gatekeeper as she passed and then stepped outside the wall. Behind her, the great Gates creaked slowly shut and the heavy bar rang as it fell into place. Betta tensed as Frei approached her, but the dwarf-woman made no attempt to take Betta's arm again.

"This way," she said, nodding to a path that veered off the main road.

As they walked, Betta looked back and down toward the crossroads where she had weeks ago met the brothers and the three ponies that would carry them on their adventure. When would she see them again? Would she ever see them again?

Frei did not go that way. She led Betta along a winding footpath that looped up and around a tall hill to the north and then turned east where it entered a dark grove of spruce and pine. Without the dependable night-vision of a Dwarf, Betta struggled to keep her feet, and more than once she tripped over a loose stone or the raised root of a malevolent tree, but she managed not to fall or to all too far behind Frei. The branches overhead blocked nearly all light from above, and without the dwarf-woman before her, Betta would have been lost less than a mile from the Gates.

It seemed a long time that they walked through that dark wood, but eventually they left branch and bough behind. A short walk along a dry riverbed took them up to an open hillside, and Betta was surprised to see the lights of the town below her. She stood upon the northern ridge of the shallow valley, and the voices of the many townspeople in their taverns and homes came faintly to her ears.

"That path is a secret known only to Dwarves," Frei said. "You'll tell no one about it."

"You need not worry about that," Betta said. "I could not find it again if I tried." She looked at the dark shape of the trees behind her and the slightly less dark rise of steep cliffs behind them. The angled peaks of the Blue Mountains were high enough to catch the light of the silver moon, and the sight of those imposing walls only strengthened Betta's certainty that she would never see Fili again. There was more than mountain walls between them.

They walked on. Frei led the way along an uneven path that climbed to the top of the ridge, ran along for a few straight yards, and then turned sharply north, zigzagging down the steep hillside. As they descended, the lights and sounds of the town were cut off by the bulk of the hill. Betta had not been this way before, and she was surprised to see more lights upon the northern side, smaller and dimmer in the distance. She could not say how far away they were, and it was too dark to guess the lay of the land.

The path that ran downhill was wide enough for a wagon, and seemed to have been cut for one; Betta walked behind Frei, keeping carefully on the path between the deep wheel-ruts. At each turn, a level step had been cut into the hill and an embankment raised to prevent runaway carts from careening over the edge. Even in dim moonlight, Betta could see that a skilled hand had fashioned this road and kept it in good-repaired.

"It was kind of you to speak up for them," Frei said suddenly, her voice drifting out of the darkness.

The words interrupted Betta's thoughts, and she stared blankly at the dwarf-woman's back for a moment. She knew that Frei meant Fili and Kili, and expected an answer from Betta, but she was uncomfortable speaking of the brothers even to a dwarf who must already know them very well. To keep silent, however might anger an already unfriendly Frei.

"I said only what was true," Betta replied. "There is little kindness in that…"

"Not always," the dwarf-woman agreed, "but few of your race take the trouble to do so when they see no benefit to themselves. Thorin would not have kept you long in the dungeons. And if they had indeed taken you there, I would have interceded myself to at least get you the best room."

"I did not know you and had no reason to think that you would," Betta said, more than a little annoyed by the dwarf-woman's proud way of speaking. "I still do not know you, but I am not afraid of any Dwarf's dungeon. I have been in jails before, and I would only have stayed there as long as it took for Fili to sneak me out again."

Frei stopped short and turned around. Betta nearly walked into her and immediately regretted her brash reply. She was close enough to see what she thought was anger in Frei's eyes, but Frei was not angry.

"Fili!" she cried, clapping a hand over her belly as if she might at any moment double over with laughter, but she only chuckled and shook her head. "No, Fili would not do that for you, not unless his brother put him up to it. If Fili wanted you out of jail, he would first try his uncle and then, when that failed, he would march down into the dungeons full of bluster and shouting orders, demanding the keys which the guards would refuse to give him – Thorin would see to that." Frei wiped mirthful tears from her eyes and sighed. "Fili would get nothing done unless his distraction kept everyone busy long enough for Kili to pick the lock. If you are looking for a foolhardy hero to save you, girl, you bet on the wrong brother."

Betta felt her cheeks flushed hot in the cold night air. She was amazed to hear Frei speak so many words at once. "Fili is not foolhardy," Betta said, "but my choice was not wrong. He is the right brother for me."

Frei crossed her arms and all amusement left her face. She looked at Betta intently. "Even if his loyalty to Thorin leaves you to rot?" she asked.

"I have been in jails before." Betta said again, and Frei raised an eyebrow. "Not all villages are eager to welcome a single woman travelling alone," she said quietly, "and fewer still will readily believe such a woman when she claims to have acted in defense of her life…" Frei frowned and her face seemed to soften a little.

In her heart, Betta did not really believe that Fili would leave her in some dungeon cell forever, but she could not deny that Frei had known him longer, and that a dwarf-woman would understand Dwarves far better than Betta could.

The two women stared at each other for a long while, and because the light was better here, Betta took her chance to examine the dwarf-woman more closely. It was strange to see so fine a beard on a female face, but she found herself marveling more at Frei's angled eyes and olive skin that was dark even in the dim moonlight. It was her foreign features, the long, black hair and strange clothes, that reminded Betta most of home.

Lebennin was part of the realm of Gondor, there had often come merchant wagon trains from the western straights that carried the poor descendants of eastern refugees, women with dark skin and dark eyes who spread their strangely-woven cloths upon the grass. They arrived with the spring and autumn markets to sell pottery to farmers' wives and beaded bracelets to the pale-skinned Gondorian maids who wore them for good luck or as love charms. In later years, when the battles between Gondor and Near Harad had grown hot again, men would whisper against the Easterling merchants, even those whose families had dwelt in the west for generations. Any man, woman or child who bore any resemblance to Gondor's enemies risked insults and worse if they showed their faces in the wrong tavern or town.

In all her travels through Eregion and beyond, Betta had never seen a Dwarf who looked like Frei, and she did not realize for how long she had stared until Frei smiled and said quietly, "Do I look so strange to you? You did not stare this way at other dwarves."

"They do not look like you," Betta said, looking down at the ground. Would her cheeks never cool! They were red with shame now and she felt certain that Frei's sharp eyes could see it.

"It would be very strange if they did." Frei motioned for them to walk on, but now she walked beside Betta and spoke more kindly to her. "There is more than one race of Dwarves, you know, just as there is more than one race of Men."

"I have heard it said but never saw proof of the rumor."

Frei nodded. "That is understandable. It is mainly Durin's folk who dwell in the West and not many of us have mingled with them. Of course, I would not be honest if I did not admit that I have had trouble distinguishing Men from Men when I see them at a distance. I would hardly know you from any other woman of your race. Your faces are so small and plain!" She laughed and then she frowned. "But my mother's land is far from here, very far away… and so, I think, is yours," she said.

"I used to think that it was far," Betta said. "But what are a hundred leagues when you have walked a thousand? I was born in Lebennin, midway between the southern coasts and the peaks of the White Mountains. There are no dwarves there that I have seen, but for twenty five years, those hills were my home. Though it may not seem very long in the long years of the dwarves, it is more than half my life so far, and a quarter of the life that I might hope to live."

"Twenty-five years is not many," Frei agreed.

"No, but it is as long as a certain Dwarf King dwelt under The Mountain. And he does not forget his home."

Frei's dark eyes gleamed as the moonlight touched upon her sharp, sidelong look. She knew what Betta's words suggested. "Two years, twenty or two hundred," Frei said. "Home will always be home."

"And where was your home?" Betta asked.

"In the mountains east of the farthest east," Frei said. "As far as you have walked and farther. There is another coastline there, very different from the one you know. The stone is softer underfoot, and the mountains taller than the sky… the forge fires burn brighter there, for that coast is nearer to the rising sun, and her flame burns hottest when she first sets sail…"

Frei fell silent, and Betta did not dare to interrupt her. The formerly grim dwarf-woman seemed softer now, and almost eager to speak. Fili had said that there were few dwarf-women in the world, and Betta wondered how long it had been since Frei had spoken openly with another of her sex. The dwarf-women of Ered Luin lived among their own kin and others who looked like them; perhaps Frei was grateful to find an unfamiliar face, an outsider like herself. Or, perhaps dwarves were not all as tight-lipped as Kili had said they would be.

"I see that you know something of the history of our race," Frei said when she spoke again. Her voice was hard and cold but not angry. "Fili told it to you?"

"He told me a little," Betta admitted. "Kili told me more, but nothing that I could not have learned from the history books of the Elves or the scrolls in the record rooms of Minas Tirith."

"Hm." Frei did not sound convinced. "Did he tell you of the war that was fought not long ago upon the slopes of the Misty Mountains when the Dwarves met the cursed Orcs in battle? I say not long ago, but it was years before your life began."

"Kili spoke of Azanulbizar."

Frei nodded. "Yes, Azanulbizar, gateway to the kingdom of Moria…" The way she spoke the names, Betta guessed that she had other words for that mountain. "Many Dwarves marched to do battle with the orcs from places much farther than Dunland and Ered Luin. From every corner of the world came Dwarves, north, east and south as well as west. The bones of the earth echoed with the sound of our footsteps."

Frei glanced at Betta. "You have trusted me with a secret of yours. One that, I think, even Fili does not know..." Betta blanched, but Frei smiled. "Your friends are of the Longbeard race, descendants of Durin, but my kin are Blacklocks of the south-eastern Red Mountains. To the Great War would go my father, my brother, my uncles and cousins. To the third generation, our people marched away, and not even my mother's love could restrain me; I wished for revenge as they did, and glory in battle. But my kin were all slain. I alone returned to her, but she would not look at me…"

Betta felt a familiar knot in her throat. "War took my brothers," she said, "and my uncles, too. I should have followed them."

"You would be dead today if you had," Frei said but before Betta could answer back, she added, "I tell the truth, and it is kindly meant. I see in your eyes that you would not be strong enough to brave the brutalities of war. Your strength is not a warrior's strength. Your heart would break."

"It was broken already."

They had reached the bottom of the hill, and the well-cut road ran ahead of them, leading toward the lights that Betta had seen from above. The moon had risen in the sky and showed the outline of a wide cabin and a back-lit barn behind it. While the two women were still far down the road, a square of yellow light appeared and as quickly disappeared. The cabin door had opened and then been closed again. A spark was struck and a lantern lit. Betta watched the swaying light move from cabin to barn, but the person who held it did not see the two women hidden in the dark.

"Gilon is working late tonight," Frei said. She stopped walking and seemed to hesitate. "That is Nan's cabin. The road runs straight. You might find your own way from here."

"I thought that you meant to visit your sister." As anxious as she had been when the dwarf-woman was grim and silent, Betta suddenly found herself reluctant to bid farewell to Frei and go amongst unfamiliar faces once more.

Frei smiled. "Nan is not my sister in the way that you mean it. We came west over the mountains together. She was my escort and my handmaiden, for a time, until…" She shook her head. "I see now why Fili and Kili would call you friend," she said. "There is something trustworthy in your face. See! Even Frei speaks openly to you things that she should not say to any but a Dwarf, and of all the Seven Families, the Blacklocks are known for their silence.

"Go now. Tell Nan why you have come, and she will make room for you. You may carry my news for me, and I will return to the mountains and my anxious husband. He does not like me to walk abroad alone." Frei's mischievous grin showed what she thought of her husband's fears.

"Thank you," Betta said. "I would ask you to give my love to Fili, but…"

"It would be best for you to forget him," Frei said, "and show your love by allowing him to forget you." She began to turn, but stopped and looked back. "The bow you gave to Kili, it was the one you used to save his life? But that is not why you gave it to him."

Betta shrugged her shoulder and gestured to her maimed right arm. She clenched the invisible fingers of her missing fist as well, but Frei could not see that. "What use do I have for a bow that I cannot shoot?" she said. "Kili will find something to do with it."

"Perhaps," Frei said. "Perhaps you can no longer bend the bow, but that does not mean you will not one day shoot your arrows again and save other lives. Farewell."

Frei turned and started up the road again; her shape was soon lost among the shadows. Betta puzzled over the riddle that the dwarf-woman had left with her, but she could make no sense of it. She turned her back on the hill and walked slowly toward the light of the cabin. Gilon was in the barn with his lantern, but she could see the reflected light of a fire dancing on the window panes. A woman's deep voice was singing.

The cabin was larger than Betta had guessed from a distance, and the front door was tall and strongly built. An iron plate and knocker had been hammered to the wood just above a narrow, iron-barred window that was shuttered on the inside. Betta struck the heavy knocker against the plate and stepped back, anxiously waiting to see what manner of woman would answer. She had knocked on many doors before, and had had almost as many slammed in her face, but this one was more important than any one of those had been.

The narrow window opened, but closed again too quickly for Betta to examine the face that peered out at her. She heard the bolt drawn back and the heavy door opened. A motherly dwarf-woman looked out at her. Her apron was smudged with soot and her forehead smeared with flour. The hair on her chin was thin, but two short, black braids hung from the corners of her jaw square. Her cheeks were red, blistered by the wind and sun, but her eyes sparkled with good humor. They were dark and angled as Frei's eyes were.

"It is a bit late to be out walking, my girl," the dwarf-woman said cheerfully, "but you know that well enough yourself. Come in! I'll put the kettle on. You sit down and tell old Nan what ails you."

Betta was too surprised to resist being ushered into the warmth of the cabin. Not that she would have refused. The large front room seemed built for comfort and the chair that Nan aimed her at was cushioned and set close by the fire. She sat and watched as the dwarf-woman drew water from a barrel to fill the dented tea kettle which hung on a hook over the fire. A small, strangely shaped cook stove sat on the opposite side of the room and smelt of baking bread and spices that Betta could not name.

In no time at all, a warm mug was pressed into her hands and Nan pulled up a chair beside her, patting her knee and once again encouraging her to "tell all". The warmth of the welcome in this place was a balm to Betta's aching heart, and twice as wonderful after the cold reception she had received beneath Ered Luin. She did not hesitate to spill out her tale from start to finish.

Nan sat silently and listened. At first, she had smiled and nodded and murmured kind words, but as Betta's tale drew on, the dwarf-woman's face grew serious and she sat back in her chair, looking into the fire. This was not the story that Nan had expected, and Betta would learn later that the dwarf-woman had at first assumed that she was only another frightened girl from town who had gotten herself into a fix with some farmer's lad and was looking for a pinch of the herbs that Nan harvested from the hillside.

After almost an hour, Betta reached the end of her story, and she imagined that the dwarf-woman sank a little deeper into her chair when she heard that Frei had turned back without visiting her. Her face was sad but not surprised.

"Well, that is a story as ever I heard one," Nan said finally. "You've gotten yourself into a heap of trouble, and not the sort of trouble that I'm used to dealing with." She sighed. "If you had any family, I'd send you on to them, but you don't and Fili was right when he said I'd find a place for you."

Betta sat still and silent. She was tired and her head ached. At least, it seemed, Nan did not mean to put her out of doors again, but Betta was not above making her bed in the barn. She was exhausted and wished only to sleep.

Before Nan spoke again, the cabin door opened and a large man entered the room. He tall even for one of the Tall Folk - almost as tall as the Men of Minas Tirith. His strong arms were thick with muscle and his heavy boots thudded like bricks on the wood floor. He was a man built for hard labor, and Betta had no doubt that he had built this cabin, the barn and might even be the one who looked after the road that she had walked to get to them. Around his neck, the man wore a heavy apron and carried two thick gloves in one hand. He carried the scent of iron and fire with him, too, and hung his lantern on a hook before nodding to Nan and then passing out of the front room and through another door into what Betta guessed must be a bedroom.

"Wait here a moment while I speak with my husband," Nan said to her as she stood up and followed after Gilon.

Betta huddled down in her chair, holding her injured arm close to her chest. She wished she knew where Fili was, what he was doing and whether his uncle was still angry with him. She wondered how Kili had fared with his surreptitious sack of gold. She no longer expected to see any of the profits from their journey. Frei was right, and it was best to forget the brothers, to look ahead and not behind. If Nan meant to keep her, then she must find a way to earn that keep. With one less hand, her life would be twice as hard.

.

At the same time that Betta and Frei were making their way down the hill toward Nan's cabin, Fili was sitting alone in the Great Hall, eating what little he could stomach of the cold meat and dry bread that had been left for him and waiting for Kili to return.

Norin and his guards had gone with Betta. Old Fror had left soon after that. Balin had had lingered long enough to offer a few words of comfort to his disconsolate cousin, but in the end, he too had gone. There were excuses to be made and rumors to subdue. Many eyes had seen Betta leave, but the few who had been in the Great Hall and heard what had been said would be keeping their mouths shut.

At first, Fili was glad that they had arrived home so late in the day, long after most Dwarves put down their work and went back to their rooms to be with their families or to sleep. Tomorrow, he would have to resume his regular duties within the mountain, checking the mines down below, speaking to the forge-master, and generally making sure that all was as it should be.

"Nothing ever changes around here," he muttered and left the Great Hall.

Kili was not coming back, and so Fili went in search of him. It would be a few days before he could safely take his knives out into the woods; under the pretense of hunting, he might steal an hour or two to visit Betta in her new home, but there would be little freedom under the mountain if Thorin thought that his quest was threatened by unseen enemies and secret spies.

Fili walked the halls, noting the same cracks in the walls, the same smoking lamp near his quarters. Nothing had changed. It was as if he had not been gone these past two months, had not nearly died, had not fallen in love. But somehow the comfort that he had once felt within these familiar walls had gone. He was restless and wished that he could speak with his brother and learn whether Kili, too, felt the tightness in his chest, the suffocating closeness of the air around him.

But Kili was not in their rooms. Their baggage had been brought in from the stable and with it the looted coins from Grahn's treasure chest. Fili left them there and walked back up to the Great hall. He knew that he could not sleep, and he had already tried and failed to eat. He wondered whether Betta had reached Nan's cabin yet and whether she felt welcome there. Gilon had built the cabin large enough, but its wooden walls were a poor substitute for the grand carved stone of the Dwarfhome. Betta would be content, Fili decided. She was used to wide-open spaces, but still, he was ashamed that he could not offer her something better.

"Not yet," he reminded himself. Once the gold of Erebor was in his hands, Thorin would be easier to reason with. He would see that Fili was determined and his love for his nephew would win out.

The Great Hall was still empty when he returned to it and, though he would rather have had a quiet conversation with his brother, Fili knew that there was someone else that he must speak to now that the others had gone to bed.

He pushed through the narrow door behind the raised dais and walked slowly down the low passage toward the Durin family library. How many long days had he spent down there with Balin leaning over him as he recited the history of their race? How often in the years since his mother's death had Fili been forced to retrieve his uncle from that room and beg Thorin to take some food or sleep? Though Fili had grown somewhat taller, the library had not changed at all. It still smelled of dust and soot and sour ink.

The fire had burned low. No one had been in to stoke up the flames and Thorin sat unmoving at his table, staring at a pile of maps without seeing them. He did not look up, though he must surely know that his nephew was there.

"Will you not speak with me?" Fili asked.

"There is nothing more to say," Thorin answered. He stood and turned his back to his nephew. He leaned his arm heavily against the mantle of the fireplace and looked into the flames. How often had he stood just so, dreaming of dragon fire? But the greatest threat to his family had come not from a dragon, but from a small, beardless woman.

"Gloin said that you have summoned our kin to these mountains. He thinks you make plans for war," Fili said, changing to a more neutral subject. "I saw Dori and Ori here tonight, and Nori, too. I am more surprised that he would come than that Gloin would abandon his business in Dunland…"

"Nori knows where his loyalties lie."

Fili winced. "Such feelings are seldom ours to order as we would, uncle. It was not my choice to fall in love."

"No, but you chose to bring her here." Thorin turned to look at him, his face full of anger and wounded pride. "You might have left her anywhere, given her money and sent her off. That would have been the honorable thing to do. Instead, you chose to bring her here and throw it in my face, this unnatural infatuation that you pretend is love!"

Fili clenched his fists and swallowed the words he might have said. Thorin would not hear them. "Betta did not think it right for me to hide this from you," he said slowly, clenching his teeth to bite back his anger. "I agreed with her reasoning. I am not ashamed of her."

"You should be ashamed of yourself!" Thorin turned his back again and waved Fili off. He was dismissed, but he did not go.

"You said before that you had made up your mind to take Kili and I to Erebor…"

"Yes, before I learned what a spectacle you had made of yourselves in the northern lands."

"That was not our fault!" Fili cried. "We had hardly any map and were not prepared for the cold and the snow. Our ponies were lost, the food ran out! The malevolence in those mountains was more than any Dwarf could bear!"

"Then you should have come home!" Thorin shouted. "So many things you say were not your choice and are not your fault… but _why did you not come home_!?"

Fili stared at his uncle. "You would rather I had given up the journey?" he asked, amazed. "Is that the lesson you wished us to learn? That when there is trouble, we must give up and go home? There will be worse than orcs and trolls when you arrive at Erebor, if you cannot raise an army to follow you. Will you travel half a world away only to look upon the dragon and then turn your back and go home?"

"Erebor _is_ our home! Or have you forgotten that!" Thorin pressed his fist down upon the table, his knuckles covering the five-pointed star that was The Lonely Mountain. "You have not seen The Mountain. You do not know those halls as I know them. You did not watch them burn!"

"No, I did not," Fili said, softening his voice and looking with pity upon his uncle's grief. "I have not seen them, nor will I ever, nor will Kili, if you do not let us go with you now and help you to reclaim them. You cannot make this journey without us." He stood at the opposite end of the table. There were no maps under his fists, but he was determined and did not flinch in the face of his uncle's fury. "You _cannot_ leave us behind."

Thorin scowled, but in his heart, he felt the stirring of pride. Maybe the lads _had_ managed to learn something useful while they were freezing their noses in the Forodwaith.

Thorin stood up straight. "I will think on what you have said. My mind is not yet made up."

As much as Fili wished for a final answer tonight, he knew that this was better than he might have had. "Thank you, uncle," he said, bowing his head in surrender, but he knew that it would not be many days before he raised this question again.

Thorin nodded and sat down. He passed his hands over the maps, but there was nothing in them that he had not memorized long ago. No new scrolls would appear at his elbow to answer the doubts that he felt in his heart or to occupy his anxious thoughts.

"You did well, Fili," he said, looking up at his nephew. "You kept Kili safe and brought him home to me. Even keeping that damned woman with you must be worth something if it kept your brother alive."

"I would have turned back many times," Fili admitted, "but Kili kept on. He is a stubborn Dwarf."

Thorin smiled. "He gets it from your mother."

"Not just our mother," Fili said, smiling sadly. "Then we are forgiven?"

"Yes, yes, forgiven," Thorin sighed, "but I must take care to keep you both under guard from now on. Who knows what trouble you will get into now that you have had a taste of adventure?"

Fili smiled. He hesitated for only a moment, but his heart demanded to know. "And what about Betta?" he asked, and saw the corners of Thorin's mouth twitch and draw back into a scowl. He pressed on. "What might she do to earn your forgiveness, uncle?"

"That woman has stolen my nephew. She has murdered the dwarflings that he would have fathered with a dwarf-woman and risked the survival of our family line. These crimes are unforgivable."

"But the blame is not hers." Fili swallowed the knot in his throat. "There must be something she might do to earn your favor…"

"Only one thing can I think of which might have caused me to look upon that creature with any favor," Thorin said, unmoved by his nephew's despair. "If she had died defending you, she would have proved herself worthy of honor. Alive, she is only a foolish woman who has bewitched my twice-foolish nephew and earned my enmity forever.

"Now, go. Leave me in peace. I have much to think on. Do not imagine that your place in my company is at all certain. I have yet to decide about you." He tugged at his beard thoughtfully. "Kili I might take, if only to keep him free of your woman's influence. I should have one heir at least by my side when I look upon Erebor again, and he seemed too friendly with her tonight..."

Fili felt his face flush red to the top of his ears. He said nothing and turned to go, but Thorin was not finished. "That woman will never again enter these halls, Fili, nor shall you leave them while I am here to prevent it. You will learn the lesson that I mean to teach: Stay away from the tall folk! They are rats on the ground and treacherous. They are beneath you."

Fili did not answer. He shut the door gently behind him and left his uncle to his maps and scrolls. The walls of the passages blurred as he walked by. Bitter tears stung his eyes, and he wondered where was Kili in all of this darkness.

.

Thorin sat for a long time, alone and stewing on his chaotic thoughts. He did not know what to do with his nephew. Of all the bad omens, this was the worst, and the best ending that he could hope for, if all that Fili said was true – which Thorin was not quite ready to admit – would be for his nephew to give up the woman and follow his uncle into spinsterhood. But that would mean cursing their folk with another childless king and hoping that Kili would not love as foolishly as had his older brother.

He sighed and stood up, feeling his tired, old bones creaking in protest. Would that he had started this quest years ago, before age had weakened his resolve. Dis had held him back for a long time, delaying him, but she could not make him forget his oath to their father. Erebor must be avenged! The Dragon would pay!

Thorin shuffled out into the Great Hall and stood before the wooden throne. He remembered the day that it had been carved from the trees upon the northern slopes of the White Mountains. Thror had always declared that the wood gave him splinters, but they were moving too often in those days to cut a stone chair worthy of the King, and it would have been too heavy to move. Thrain suffered the demeaning seat with less complaint than his father had, but then, the first time that he had taken the throne was the day old Nar announce that Thror had been killed by the hand of Azog the Cursed at Moria.

The Dwarves of Durin had dwelt for many years within Ered Luin, and Thorin might have long ago commissioned a grand seat of stone, tall and proud, a throne that his people could look upon with honor and respect. But he had not done it. To build such a throne would be to admit that this was his kingdom now, this dismal, diminished realm by the sea. It would be to abandon all hope of reclaiming Erebor, and that, Thorin could not do.

"One does not change the past by frowning at it," a stern voice spoke up behind him, "and it is the future that concerns us now, Thorin Oakenshield!"

Thorin spun around, his hand reaching for the axe that was not at his belt. Why carry weapons in his own hall, he often said, but he wished for one now.

"Is that any way to greet an old friend?"

"Old you may be, Tharkun, but whether we are friends remains to be seen," Thorin answered. "You have taken your time in coming. It has been months since you promised to join me here."

"I was delayed," Gandalf said, stepping out of the shadows. "I was finding things out, as usual, many things that you would be interested to hear."

"If these things interest me, then I know them already," Thorin said. "I have my own way of gathering news."

"I do not doubt that you do." Gandalf frowned down at the exiled Dwarf King. "Is there a more private where we may speak? I have heard much of your story already, but I would like a bit more detail before I decide what help I can offer you… if any."

"This hall is private enough. We will not be interrupted here," Thorin said, but he felt the heavy weight of his father's throne behind him. "However, I take your meaning. You wizards are always looking for some close and quiet room in which to do your meddling. This way." Thorin started back down the hall toward the library.

"I do not 'meddle'," Gandalf said. "Do not forget, Thorin Oakenshield, that it was _you_ who asked for _my_ help, and I have not yet decided whether I will give it to you."

"Nor have I decided whether I will take it," Thorin said. "Who let you in, anyway? I ordered the Gates locked at nightfall."

"I was told that I was expected," Gandalf said, which was not really an answer, nor was it meant to be one.

Thorin glanced at the old Wizard, unconvinced, but he was not about to argue so small a point. He would have a word with Norin in the morning, and with whoever had been on watch at the Gate. At least, the Wizard should have been announced before he had reached the Great Hall. Two sneaking visitors in one night, what was this mountain coming to!

* * *

**I miss my old followers and their lovely reviews :( ****I hope you all are enjoying the drama anyway, even if most of you aren't telling me whether you enjoy it ;) **

**Only a few days left until DOS EE!**

**-Paint**


	6. Many Meetings, Plans Are Made

**Middle-earth, and all who dwell within it, belongs to Tolkien. I am grateful to him for growing this beautiful garden in which our imaginations can play. Please review!**

* * *

The fire in the Durin family library had burned down to a smoldering lump of embers, but it had burned hot for so long in recent days while Thorin brooded over his maps that the heat had sunk into the walls and the room smelt like an over-baked kiln, sharp and metallic. Many piles of unrolled parchment creaked softly in the dry air, and the only other sound was the whisper of Gandalf's breath as he sucked on his long pipe. He had hardly spoken to ask questions as Thorin repeated the old stories of the coming of the dragon and the greed and gold-sickness that had affected his grandfather in the months before; he sat thinking and puffing at his pipe while wreathes of smoke twined around his grey head.

Thorin had said his piece and sat now silently as well, smoking his own pipe and thinking back on old times. As a young dwarf, he had often wondered whether Thror's love of gold – powerful even for a Dwarf – and his eagerness to hoard as much of the stuff as he could, digging it out of the mountain's deep roots and piling it in hall upon hall, room after room… had his grandfather's gold-sickness not been part of what brought the foul beast down upon them?

Gandalf waved away his worries. "That is superstition, nothing more," he said, shaking his head, but Thorin was not convinced. "I do not doubt that rumors of a hill of gold within Erebor were what brought Smaug to the mountain," Gandalf went on. "Had your folk been less greedy, you would have had less gold to tempt the dragon, but that is the only way that your grandfather's moods had anything to do with it."

Thorin did not agree with the wizard, nor did he disagree. As Gandalf often said, the past could not be changed, and it did little good to argue over what had or had not brought down the calamity that was Smaug.

"But I know of the dragon already," Gandalf said. "And I know that there are many grievances held throughout the long history of the Dwarves. What I wish to know now is why, Thorin? Why _now_? Surely this injustice has smoldered long in the hearts of your kin, your father and your grandfather. What stokes the fire to burning now, and so suddenly that you would stop me upon the road? That is what I wish to understand before I decide whether it is worth the trouble I would be at in helping you."

Thorin frowned and leaned back in his chair. Before entering the library, he had summoned the nearest dwarf and sent him off to find Balin. His cousin should be here for this meeting, but he was late in coming. Thorin closed his eyes and, for a moment, he saw his sister's face, frowning at him and shaking her head.

"You are right that the flame has long burned in my breast," he said, opening his eyes again. "Thror wandered toward Moria because he knew that he could not get near his own home. He was killed by the goblins, and thus began the Great War…"

"So I have heard," Gandalf said, nodding.

"But before Thror left, he charged my father to one day reclaim our lost kingdom. And to that same oath did my father swear me…" Thorin watched Gandalf closely through narrowed eyes. "I do not doubt that your many spies have also told you that Thrain, my father, went missing many years ago."

Gandalf frowned and did not answer.

"After the war with the orcs, Thrain returned with me and built these halls and helped to settle our wandering people, but it was not long after that that he was overcome with a desire to see his ancient home again. He knew the time was not ripe to reclaim the Lonely Mountain, but he imagined that he might… No, I will say it now: he was _obsessed_ with the idea that he could creep in and take back some small treasure that would sooth his longing and comfort him in his old age. I could not dissuade him and he departed with only a handful of others, leaving me behind to lead our people in his stead.

"My father reached the western eaves of Mirkwood before he was overtaken by his enemies. In the dark of night, he vanished and none have seen him since, but I do not believe that he is dead. He is out there somewhere, perhaps witless and wandering, but alive! I have searched for him to no avail, but I refuse to give up hope. He may yet be found or some word of him will reach me, but through all my fruitless searching it has become clear to me is that the time is now to fulfill my father's oath. The Mountain has lain too long in our enemy's hands.

"You ask what stokes this flame to burning?" Thorin struck his fist upon the arm of his chair. "Nothing! The fire has always burned hot in my breast, but even righteous anger must bide its time and build the strength it needs to act. I have sent word to all my kin, summoning the willing to once again wield axe and hammer in vengeance for the fallen. I ask for your aid, Tharkun, but with or without it, I wait only for my friends to answer my call, and then we will ride to Erebor and take back what is ours!"

Gandalf frowned and smoked furiously at his pipe. He did not like what he had heard, but he said nothing. Thorin, too, was frowning. His anger had faltered and he stared down at the map before him

"And yet…" he said quietly.

Gandalf looked up.

"And yet, perhaps my father _did_ reach the mountain. He was headed that way when he went missing. Perhaps he lost his companions but found his path alone through the woods. Thror had a secret way out of Erebor; of this, I am certain. How else could he and my father have escaped the wrath of the dragon with only singed beards and no wounds upon them? And, if there is a way out, then there must be a way in… a secret door known only to my father and grandfather. If Thrain did indeed reach the mountain, could he not, even now, be living in those halls that he loved, hiding within sight of the beast and waiting for help to find him?"

Thorin looked to Gandalf with hope in his eyes, but Gandalf shook his head.

"Thrain is not in Erebor," he said. "Smaug knows the scent of Dwarf far too well to allow even one of your race to dwell so near to him, and there is no hole so small that he would not sniff your father out if he were there. No, if Thrain reached Erebor alone and entered it, by a secret way or by the front door, then he is certainly dead."

Thorin's shoulders sank and he stared into the fireplace, his brow furrowed in anger. "Even you cannot know for certain," he said. "My father possessed a power of his own, a secret token of our family. Thror gave it to him before he went to Moria, but my father did not pass it on to me. Who knows what that power might do, how long it might keep its bearer hidden from prying eyes or sniffing noses…"

Gandalf shook his head again, but he was not thinking of Thorin or of Thrain any longer. His gaze turned inward, looking back in time; he sank deep into long, forgotten memory and saw another dwarf, a pitiable and starving creature huddled against the iron bars of a cell beneath Dol Guldur. _'They took it from me'_, the nameless dwarf had said, and _'Please, give these to my son'_, as he pressed a tarnished key and torn map into Gandalf's hands. But the son had been nameless and the dwarf had died before Gandalf could learn more about him. Could it have been Thrain who died a prisoner of the Necromancer? Had that broken mind once belonged to the proud, High King of Durin's folk, the bearer of the Seventh Dwarf Ring?

The library door opened and Gandalf's thoughts were interrupted. He looked and then he smiled as Balin entered the room. The old dwarf bowed and greeted him eagerly.

"Ah, Tharkun," Balin said. "I was beginning to think you had forgotten us."

"Not forgotten," Gandalf said, "but I have many cares in this world and not all have to do with Dwarves."

Balin nodded, but Gandalf's words brought back Thorin's anger. "What other cares you have, I care nothing for them. I have answered your questions. Now, what help do you have to offer _me_? That is why we are here. I know that you did not come at the head of any army, and I can think of little else that would be of use against a dragon."

Gandalf sighed. "No, I have no army, and if I had, it would be of better use elsewhere. And in any case, what would you do with an army if you had one? Smaug is ancient and powerful; he has lain long, gathering his strength and biding his time just as you have, and the long years do not wear him down as they do mortal Men and Dwarves."

Thorin sneered at him. "I am not one of your pet humans, aged and decrepit. Dwarves older than I have swung their axes in battle and been victorious."

"You think that you can face the dragon head on?" Gandalf was growing impatient. "Then you have no need of me. But before I go, tell me, where are these hardened warriors that you mean to lead? Where are your armies, King Oakenshield?"

Thorin sank back in his chair with sullen frown. "They will come. I have called them and they will come. My cousin Dain will not forsake me. Two thousand, at least, I can expect from him, but they need not march all the way to Ered Luin to be counted."

"They will not come," Gandalf said, trying to be gentle, but his thoughts were on Dol Guldur and the news that had only recently reached him. Darkness was spreading beneath the boughs of the Greenwood, evil creatures menaced the Wilderlands and the passes through the mountains were becoming less and less safe even for large wagon trains. If Thorin waited for his armies to com that way, he would wait long indeed.

"They will not come or not enough will come," Gandalf insisted. "There are not enough dwarves left in the world to face a dragon of Smaug's strength and size; he is crafty and quick. Even if there were ten times as many Dwarves and they were ten times as strong, he would hear rumor of your coming long before you reached him. He will set upon you before you have time to gather together."

Thorin shook his head. He pointed down at the map. "You speak as if I would not have given thought to this already," he said. "We will take our wagons a dozen at a time down the Greenway. In Dunland we will shelter before passing through the gap. Then, keeping behind the foothills of the White Mountains, we will make for the river, crossing below the Greenwood. From there, we go north and form our ranks upon the eastern shore of Celduin. Dain and his dwarves might join us there and together we will march upon the mountain. We will be camped upon Smaug's doorstep before he knows anything about it, and if there is any rumor to hear it will be of merchant dwarves on a journey of visit and trade, nothing more."

Thorin smiled at his plan as he had outlined it, but Gandalf laughed at him. "Nothing more!" he said. "You think that Smaug would dismiss rumor of a great assembly of Dwarves heading his way as nothing more than that? And you make the journey sound so simple, but I promise you, there are other and greater dangers along the road you have chosen! You will attract the eye of every enemy of Dwarves, not to mention the other Kings who rule the lands that you must cross. They will not be eager to let a company of a thousand armed soldiers camp upon their lands."

"Other Kings!" Thorin leaped to his feet, his rage nearly boiled over. "Other Kings did nothing to help my people in our hour of need! They will do nothing now to hinder me." He regretted confiding in the wizard at all and was ready to throw him out, but Balin spoke up first.

"Perhaps Gandalf is right," he said gently. "It is a long road to walk with only our hope that no news will reach Smaug before we do. And we do not yet know how many dwarves will join us on the way. It has been months since you sent your messengers toward the Iron Hills. How many have returned, Thorin? I have not had time to ask, what answer have you had?"

Thorin sat down again. "I have had no answer," he admitted.

"Then that _is_ your answer," Gandalf said. "Dain will not come. He is wiser than you and will see that it is folly to face the dragon head-on. His folk still hold in their hearts the memory of the destruction of the Dwarf Halls of Ered Mithrin."

"You speak of other Kings, Gandalf" Balin said carefully. "What of the Elvenking? Surely he cannot be over fond of his new neighbor…?"

Thorin scowled, and Gandalf shook his head. They both knew how likely it was for King Thranduil to risk his elven host against the dragon, and even if he were willing, Thorin would never ask for aid from that quarter.

Thorin clenched his hand into a fist. "If this is all the aid you offer me, Tharkun, to council caution and cowardice, then go. Leave my halls! Too long have I listened to naysayers and those who would tell me to delay. Be gone, wizard, and take your craven council elsewhere!"

"Thorin, please!" For the second time that night, Balin watched as his cousin cast from their halls a guest who did not deserve his anger.

"Caution and cowardice are not the same thing," Gandalf said sternly. "Your grandfather understood this, even if you do not. And it is a wise man who listens to those who do not agree with him."

Thorin crossed his arms and turned his back, but Gandalf did not leave yet.

"King you may be, Thorin Oakenshiled, but a king in exile. You have no armies to command, and if you have spent all your time planning battle strategies and counting spears and axes, then your quest will certainly fail, with or without my help. But I do not advise you to abandon your oath, only to be wise in the actions that you take."

Thorin did not speak nor did he turn around. Gandalf sighed and stood up to go, but he was reluctant to leave without some agreement. He had begun to suspect that this stubborn dwarf's quest might indeed prove to be a part of the larger doings of the world. The memory of the nameless prisoner of Dol Guldur refused to leave him, and knowing that Thrain had worn one of the Seven suggested that there was more at work here than chance.

"Be angry with me if you will, Thorin, but one thing I will say: you have convinced me that the dragon must be dealt with, and soon. I have not given up on you yet, and I do not council you to wait long. I have another task that presses me before I will be free to turn all my thoughts on you. I must go south to the Havens, but as I walk, I will consider what you have said. I do not doubt that I will have a plan for you when I return, and a better one than this. Farewell."

With that, Gandalf took his hat and staff and left the library. Balin looked to his cousin, but Thorin had his back to him and was leaning against the mantle, staring into the fire. He would stand that way for half an hour at least, Balin knew, and so he hurried after the wizard instead.

He caught up to Gandalf in the passage outside the Great Hall just as the wizard was looking around for a guide, and Balin offered his service. They started toward the front door.

"His pride will be his downfall," Gandalf muttered.

"He is only anxious," Balin said. "There are other matters, family matters, on his mind tonight. In the morning, he will look upon your council with more welcoming eyes."

"I hope so." They had reached the front door and Gandalf stood looking out across the shallow valley toward the dark horizon. He thought of The Shire and his long-wished for rest. That, too, would have to wait. "I will be gone four weeks," he told Balin, "and not a day longer."

"I suppose it would do no good to ask, what business you have with the Elves of the Havens…?"

A dark look passed over Gandalf's face and he shook his head.

"Well, good journey to you, then," Balin said, "and good luck. I hope we will have a warmer welcome waiting for you when you return."

"As do I," Gandalf agreed.

He had to shake the sleeping gatekeeper awake so that the bleary-eyed dwarf might open the gates to let him through. One last time, Gandalf looked toward The Shire with regret, and then turned his feet south toward Mithlond. Cirdan would have good food and good advice that would revive him, but it was not the gentle balm of the hobbit folk. The Elf Lord had not left his havens for three hundred years or more, but Gandalf hoped that by carrying his words to the White Council he might finally persuade them to deal with Dol Guldur. Thorin Oakenshield was an unreliable - and unwitting - ally in the struggle that Gandalf saw ahead of them, but there was no time to choose a better.

.

Kili stood in the dark, holding his breath and listening as intently as he could to the passages around him. There was no good reason for any other dwarf to be down so deep among the store rooms, but that only meant that if _he_ were seen there, he would have many difficult questions to answer. Kili had no reason to be down here either – no reason that he could give.

The lowest storerooms had long ago been emptied of their winter stock, and they would not be opened up again until the autumn harvest was brought in at the end of the year. Kili had not even had to pick the lock to get into the room where he had hidden Betta's gold behind an old apple barrel and beneath a mound of half-rotten burlap sacks. He was tempted to lock the door behind him, but a locked door down here would raise more suspicion, and it may well be Fili who came to retrieve the gold. His brother was not as good at lock-picking as Kili was.

Satisfied that he heard no distant footsteps, Kili started up the passage walking as quickly as he could. He carried no torch, the better not to be seen, but he trailed his right hand along the narrow ledge that was cut into the wall. A series of bumps and ridges marked each hall, door and crossing within the Dwarfhome. They would have been almost invisible even in full torchlight, but every dwarf in Ered Luin knew them and could read them by touch.

Kili hardly needed the markings to tell him where he was. He and his brother had gone on many secret adventures down in these lowest levels when they were young lads. That was important: that he had choosen a hiding place that his brother would know as well as himself. They might speak of it in guarded terms so that even if they were overheard, they would not be understood.

At each winding stair or intersecting hall, Kili stopped to listen, but even underground there was a time to sleep and a time to wake, and nearly every dwarf in the mountain would be sleeping now. Eventually, he was far enough away from the hiding place, that Kili finally allowed himself to breathe a sigh of relieve and to smile at his own cleverness. No one would find Betta's gold where he had stashed it, not even crafty Gloin who could smell out a gold piece buried in a bin of coal. He…

Kili stopped short. Ahead of him, he saw a light. It grew brighter as it drew nearer, coming around the corner and he looked for a cross hall or doorway to duck and hide behind, but the hallway was long and straight for many yards behind him. He would be found out before he could hide.

With no other choice, he straightened his shoulders, raised his chin and walked forward, hoping that he did not look as guilty as he felt.

Kili recognized Frei before she knew he was there. He had had warning of her coming, but to her eyes, he appeared suddenly out of the shadows, and so lost in thought was she that upon seeing him she started back in surprise and cried out, "Careful there!" Her hand going to her waist.

He held up his hands, and she looked at him more closely. "Kili? What are you doing down here, sneaking about in soft shoes and carrying no light?" She eyed his boots suspiciously.

"They are no softer than any other shoe I wear," he lied. "I wished for a quiet place to think, and this place is often as good as any for such things." That was closer to the truth.

"Hm…" Frei frowned at him. No one would have been surprised to meet Fili wandering down some dark hallway in the middle of the night. Nor would they have wondered at the frown on his face or thought it strange for him to have so many thoughts in his head that he could not hear the voices calling out to him, but Kili was not his brother. It was well known that he did little by way of thinking and more by way of doing.

He said nothing, and that only deepened Frei's suspicion. "I suppose that Fili has you on some secret errand," she said, seeing Kili's anxious face. "Do not fear. I will not ask you what it is. I have no desire to be drawn any deeper into your family troubles. It is bad enough that my husband has been ensnared by you…"

"I set no snares," Kili protested. "And Dwalin has had nothing to do with it."

"Ha! No, not you, but your uncle would drag us all east with him if he could manage it," she said, and Kili stared at her in confusion. His thoughts were on his brother and Betta, and he expected Frei to be thinking the same. She was not. "Do not pretend that you do not understand me. Though Thorin has yet to say who he will take or which way he means to go, I know where his road will end. Do not forget that Dis was my friend. She spoke too often of her fears for her brother and his quest."

"Thorin made no secret of his plans for Erebor," Kili stammered. "No secret among Dwarves, anyway."

"Perhaps not," Frei said, "but he does not tell us _how_ he will go. Will it be with an army marching openly over the mountains, or will he send us in disguise, in scattered companies creeping along like mice? Whichever it is, I will not be left behind. Those with sense must look after those without it, and Dwalin would follow his cousin off a cliff if Thorin asked him to go." She frowned and her gaze grew distant. "But it will not be an army, will it? We have no armies left."

"I do not know," Kili said weakly. He did not know what to say to her. Thorin had not kept his plans _intentionally_ secret from his people, but neither had he announced them in any great detail. Kili had been away for many weeks with his brother, and he had not heard all the rumors that had grown from his uncle's strange behavior. He could not silence Frei's speculation; he did not know his uncle's plans, how they would enter Erebor what they would do with the dragon once they got there.

Frei looked hard at him. "Keep your secrets, then," she said angrily. "It is the best for you, I do not doubt, but I have heard your uncle mutter under his breath. He counts dwarves by the thousands, and his allies upon both his hands. He wonders whether the other Families will aid him as they aided his father after Thror was killed."

Kili's eyes widened. He could not help himself. He knew that Thorin was making military plans and guessed that he would have sent word to Dain who dwelt so near to The Mountain; only a fool would refuse to ask for _his_ help, but it had never entered his mind – nor Fili's either, he guessed – that Thorin would be proud enough to call upon the other six Houses. They had fought the Great War to avenge the death of Thror, certainly, but would they fight the dragon? That loss was long ago, and they had sent no word that Kili knew of.

"It is true, then…" Frei said, seeing his surprise and imagining that her guess had hit near to the mark.

"I did not say that it was," Kili said quickly. "I seldom know what is in my uncle's mind. He has yet to share his plans for this with me, or with anyone else, I think, but I do know that Thorin would not take any dwarf to The Mountain who did not wish to go."

"You are growing up well, lad," Frei said, and it was a compliment to him in spite of her bitter words. "You are old enough to use your head. Thorin will take no dwarf against his will, this is true, but what dwarf in this mountain would refuse? How many of your own family followed Thrain to their deaths? How many of mine?" She sighed.

"Well, I will tell you this," Frei went on, "and I hope you tell your uncle, and that he listens to you: If thorin asks for aid from the other houses, they will send none. Dwalin is convinced that Dain will come, and that he might even rouse some of his friends from among the Broadbeams, but I am not so certain. I do know that none from the east will answer his call. Already, they whisper amongst themselves, 'How many times must we rescue the fallen sons of Durin? Can their kings not manage their own affairs?'"

"When have you spoken to the other houses?" Kili asked.

Frei smiled. "You think that I would forsake my own kin now that I live among yours?" She shook her head. "No. They will sooner forsake me. Do you not wonder why the other houses of the Dwarves do not mingle with the descendants of Durin? Especially with Thror's sons? Take care, Kili, and I hope that whatever darkness lies upon your family will pass you by."

With that, Frei stepped around him and, taking her lantern with her, she walked swiftly down the passage and was gone. Kili found himself once more left in darkness. He was at first too stunned to answer to the false accusations that she had laid upon his family and, now that she was gone, he wondered whether they were indeed false. If she were not a Dwarf, or if she had been a Dwarf-man, he might have challenged her for the insult, but even there, he was not sure. In all their speculation, neither Kili nor Fili had imagined that Thorin would summon the other six Houses. The Stonefoots and Blacklocks, the Stiffbeards and Ironfists, the Broadbeams and Firebeards, they seldom mingled with the Longbeards of the west. As far as Kili knew, Frei and Nan alone had journeyed beyond Hithaeglir.

But what reason would they have to come west at all, Kili told himself. There was little to trade and less to mine in the broken Blue Mountains, and Moria could not be reclaimed. Just because he had never heard of the six Houses trading with the seventh did not mean that it was not done. Thror must have had dealings with them when he dwelt at Erebor.

For the first time that he could remember, Kili wondered how Frei spoke with her Blacklock kin since coming to Ered Luin. Many hundreds of leagues lay between the Blue Mountains and the Red, and if no trade passed between them, no messengers would, either.

As a lad, he had admired the warrior dwarf-woman and had often named her among the greatest heroes of the old wars. He admired her strange tattoos, and she had more skill with a sword than most dwarves had with an axe. And yet, as he had grown up and grown older, he began to feel anxious around her. He imagined that behind her bright eyes and quick laugh she was not as happy at Ered Luin as she pretended to be. More than one dwarf had accused her of mistrusting the Longbeards, a rumor that was not completely silenced by the fact that she had married one of them.

Kili had no doubt that Frei loved her husband, but what did she think when she looked at the rest of them with those angled eyes? She had looked upon the far eastern shores and seen more of Middle-earth than Kili. More than Betta, even.

Feeling sick in his heart and uncertain of himself, Kili continued up the passage and made his way back to the rooms that he shared with his brother. He walked in darkness until he reached the hall where a lamp was lit outside their door. He opened it quietly and entered.

Fili's own lamp was lit upon the low table between their two beds, and he lay in his bed still dressed and with one arm thrown up over his eyes. Kili assumed that he was asleep, but almost as soon as he had shut the door, Fili was on his feet and hurrying to his brother's side.

"You have hidden it, then?" he asked, seeing that Kili's hands were empty. "Where? It is in a safe place?"

"No one will find it down there," Kili assured him, and quickly described where he had hidden Betta's gold. "No one will be in those rooms until the end of the year, and we shall have made our arrangements long before then."

"Good. That is good," Fili said, nodding. "I have been thinking about it, and we might easily trade all that we have of the raw gold for stamped coin. It should only take a week or two. Thorin will be wanting gold to buy supplies and hire wagons for the journey, and it is my task to look over the bookkeeping. I might easily move a few numbers from one column to the next without changing the total. We are not _taking_ any gold, after all, only trading it."

Fili hesitated even as he spoke. They were not taking, but still he did not like even the smallest deceit used against his own folk. He was walking a narrow ledge with his uncle already, and he wished that Thorin would have paid Betta what she had earned so that none of this trickery was necessary. If they had more time, he might have melted down their gold and stamped the coins himself.

"We should also try to trade as many gold coins as we can for silver and copper pennies," Kili said.

"What for? The gold will be hard enough to get…" Fili shook his head.

"Because gold coins get noticed," Kili reminded him. "Give me some credit for thinking ahead, brother. The town is not large, and our folk are often down there for trade. Someone is bound to wonder why Betta is suddenly spending Dwarven gold, and word will get back to Thorin. Those coins may not be missed from the treasury, but they are still traceable. Poverty is the best protection against thieves, I heard an old woman say once and, though I think that a strong arm and an axe is better, for those without weapons, the _appearance_ of poverty will do just as well."

Fili nodded and sank down heavily onto the edge of his bed. "You are right," he said, "but that will take much longer and we must be careful about it… or, _you_ must be careful. Thorin has given orders that I am not allowed to set foot outside this mountain, and Betta cannot enter it. He knows that I mean to see her again…"

Kili sighed and sat down across from his brother. "You spoke with him then?"

"He is angry with me, but you have had more luck. Thorin believes that you, too, have fallen under Betta's spell, but he thinks you not so far gone. He may well decide to take you to Erebor to get you out of the reach of her bad influence… and mine."

"I will not go without my brother," Kili said. He kicked off his shoes and lay back on his bed. "All our adventures and we end up back in the same place, arguing over who goes to Erebor and who stays home." He laughed and looked at his unhappy brother. "Do not worry, Fili. How many times has Thorin declared that I must not go to town, and how many times have I slipped past his guard and had my fun anyway? You will see Betta again, and you and I both shall see Erebor one day. I know that we will."

Fili was not convinced, but he could not resist his brother's laughter and soon he was smiling, too. "Where there is life, there is hope, eh, brother?" he said.

"One problem at a time," Kili agreed. "And in one of our troubles, at least, I think that we might rely on Nan and her husband. Gilon trades freely with both Men and Dwarves – even if the Dwarves will not admit to it – and no one would suspect him of ill-getting his gains if he should find himself holding a few extra coins."

Fili sighed and then he smiled. "What would I do without you, brother? Nothing ever dampens your mood."

Kili smiled, but he was not as content as he pretended to be. He was still troubled by Frei's words, and by Fili's suggestion that Thorin might decide to take one brother and not the other. They said little else that night. They dressed for sleep and tucked themselves under their blankets, sinking into the comfort of familiar beds after so many weeks away. Not even Kili's troubled thoughts could keep him long awake after Fili put out the lamp. He was tired and they were both soon fast asleep.

.

Far away in a lonely cabin at the bottom of a hill, Gilon had lain a mattress on the floor for Betta near the fireplace in the long, front room. There were three smaller rooms along the back wall of the cabin, and one of those would be fit up as a bedroom for her, Nan promised, but for now, it was too full of tools and cloth, food stuff and spare wood. In the morning, they would clean it out and Gilon would put back together the frame that had been his mother's bed.

Both Nan and Gilon were kind to her and said nothing of the trouble that she had put them to. Even so, a mattress on the floor was more than Betta had expected to be given; to have a room to call her own and proper bed would be a luxury she had almost forgotten.

She was warm and safe within four walls, but Betta could not sleep. Long after her hosts had gone to their rest, she lay awake, staring up at the ceiling. The room was dark save for the glow of the embers and the sliver of silver moonlight that slipped through the curtains' seams. It had been so long since she had had a roof over her head that the sounds were strangely muffled in her ears.

After turning fitfully for over an hour, she sat up and pushed back her knotted hair. Her maimed arm did not trouble her; Nan had fixed a broth of herbs for the pain. It was something else that kept her from sleep.

Quietly, Betta took up her pack and reached inside, past the scraps of cloth and broken leather, past her spare blanket to the very bottom. She drew out the old silver box and looked at it in the dim light.

How many times had she stared at that box in Dwarf forges and the inns of Men, from cold caves to warm hillsides? A piece of frayed string tied the lid to the base, and the silver was tarnished and darker than it had been so many weeks ago before Fili broke the seal and revealed the torn map and pearl. The pearl was gone, dropped into the sea many hundreds of leagues north of Ered Luin, and the map was worthless now. No treasure lay at the end of it.

Her journey was over. What was she to do now? She wondered.

Fili did not understand. How could he? He was a prince. He had his family and his uncle's quest ahead of him. He had never had to wonder what was his place in the world.

The room was cold, and Betta tucked herself back under the blankets, holding the box tight in her left hand. Nan had sworn to take over the treatment of Betta's maimed arm, which had been sorely neglected in recent days. She had said that Betta might learn herb lore as well and help the old dwarf-woman at her trade. That would be something, a first step toward earning her own keep, Betta thought, but she hoped for more, for a life of her own that she could be proud of.

She closed her eyes and hoped that Fili was well. She had not given him up, but wherever he was, at least he was home. How long until Betta could say the same for herself?


	7. Kili Slips Away

**Middle-earth, and all who dwell within it, belongs to Tolkien. I am grateful to him for growing this beautiful garden in which our imaginations can play. Please review!**

* * *

Kili stood in the low archway between the armory and the training hall, his face turned toward two young dwarves who were beating bruises into each other with dull-bladed axes, barely using their dented shields. Fror hovered nearby, doing his best to prevent the lads from doing any permanent damage – to the weapons, anyway; while Dwalin stood against the wall, laughing at the three of them. Kili smiled, too, but he had little interest in the mock battle. He faced it, but his eyes were on Fror.

The old dwarf had been specially selected by Thorin to keep an eye on his youngest nephew and, for three days, he had done his job all too well. Kili hardly found time in the evenings between dinner and sleep to slip away from watchful eyes and go down to the store room to collect his pocket full of raw gold. Last night, he had been nearly caught as he returned from the lower levels and he could not count on his luck forever.

Today was the first day that old Fror had looked away from his charge for more than a moment, and then only because he feared for the safety of his training gear. The two lads were barely competent, but they were eager and determined to practice with iron weapons instead of wood. Undoubtedly, Fror thought himself safe to turn his back on Kili in this hall. There was only one door and, though it was wide open and unguarded, it was a long ways away and Fror would see him before he could reach it.

Almost as if he read his thoughts, Fror clear his throat, and Kili realized that the old dwarf was staring straight at him. He had, of course, been staring hard at the far door, calculating his chances. Fror smiled and shook his head, but Kili turned his eyes up to the high, vaulted ceiling, pretending not to notice. It grated on him to be held prisoner within his own home. _He_ was not the one who had angered their uncle, and Fror took too great a pleasure in his increased authority over the brothers.

Kili hid his smile and put his hand in his pocket. Fror might think that he had the upper hand now, but he did not know that Kili had long ago fashioned a copy of the key to the broad iron door that led out of the armory itself. That door was behind him, hidden on the other side of the archway, and it led straight back to a forge that was only ever used to sharpen or mend the weapons for the training hall. The door was kept locked, but years ago, he had managed to get hold of the master key. His goal then had been to get _inside_ the hall, to blacken the handles of the training axes and swords so that the dwarves who handled them got soot on their hands, their faces, and everything else that they touched. Afterwards, once Thorin had discovered who had been responsible, Kili had spent two weeks with a rag in his hand and a bucket at his feet, wiping the soot from dozens of weapons and repenting of his prank. But the key had never been discovered. It was assumed that he had slipped in through the training hall when no one was looking and no one thought to search him.

Today, that same key would let Kili _out_ of the armory. Fror was distracted, and the few other dwarves in the hall had looked away, so Kili stepped backwards into the shadows behind the arch. All he needed was the right moment, and then…

"Kili! Dwalin! Stop your laughter and be useful!" Fror shouted. Kili froze, but the old dwarf had not caught him in his escape; he only wanted something to occupy the incorrigible youths. "Come now, show these dwarflings the proper way to swing an axe," Fror called.

Kili sighed and stepped back into the training hall. Dwalin was already striding forward, eager to get his hands on a weapon, even if it _was_ made of wood. The young dwarves stopped their struggle and backed away. Dwalin was a full head and shoulders taller than they were, though he was only a head taller that Kili who was more reluctant than his cousin to do battle. He looked back toward the armory with regret, but he could not refuse without arousing Fror's suspicion.

Though he would rather have held a bow, Kili chose a single-bladed axe from the rack; Dwalin, of course, chose his favorite war hammer. Fror had good reason to protect his training weapons better than he protected his trainees; they were solidly built, but light in the hand and well-balanced. The handles were strong iron but on most the heads and blades had been replaced or faced with the softer wood, yet in the right hands, they could still break bone, and Kili could attest to the pain of a blow from the flat of the hammer. The younger dwarves used weapons made entirely of wood, light enough to allow them to stop their swings or turn them aside and do less injury to their opponent… not that the lads Fror was training today had done either. Kili remembered his own youth spent beating his brother full of bruises while Fili had done the same to him, but they always laughed about it together afterwards.

Hefting the training axe in his hand, Kili raised an eyebrow at the much larger hammer that Dwalin held. The head was faced with wood, but the rest was solid iron.

"You are planning to teach them how to flatten their friends, cousin?" he asked.

Dwalin smiled sheepishly. "You think that I should go easy on you, lad?" he said, and put down the large hammer. He took up a smaller size, this one with a head carved entirely of wood.

"I think that my uncle has heaped my shoulders high with chores to do this week," Kili answered, "and that he would not be glad to hear that you have left me unable to finish them."

Dwalin nodded and looked at Kili with sympathy. He was one of the few who knew exactly why Thorin was angry with his nephews, but he had had an earful from Balin about keeping his mouth shut. Not that he would have spoken of what he had seen and heard in the Great Hall three nights before. The few who knew the full depth of Fili's shame had not spoken of it even to each other. To the rest of the mountain, it was only guessed at that there had been a falling out between Thorin and his heir over the human woman. Most thought that it was because Fili had broken the established law and brought her into the Dwarfhome. Few imagined that it could be more than that, and all agreed that it would blow over in time.

"Now, lad, we shall see if the cold north froze your arms as well as your wits," Dwalin said. He swung first, aiming his hammer at Kili's unguarded knees.

Caught by surprise, Kili jumped up into the air, stumbling backwards to avoid the blow. '_Keep your feet on the ground!'_ He heard his brother's voice shouting in his head. It was the one thing that he could never remember when he fought Fili sword to sword. And his brother never failed to take advantage, knocking him to the ground over and over, demanding, _'How do you expect to escape an orc's blade when you are hanging helpless in the air!?'_

_'__I would not need to escape it if I had my bow,'_ was Kili's inevitable answer as he lay on the ground with his brother laughing and striking at his ankles with the tip of his blade. Dwalin was more charitable, and he waited until Kili had found his balance before bearing down again.

"Had enough already, lad?" he asked.

"Not yet," Kili said, grinning. He swung his axe in his hand as he circled his cousin. There would be no opening, he knew; Dwalin was much too good a fighter for that, but he was also much larger than Kili was, and a two-handed hammer was harder to wield than a light axe.

They met again in the middle, each swinging his own weapon while the other ducked and danced out of the way. Kili could not help but think how much easier it would have been to fight with Fili at his back, but he had learned one thing in the cold mountains of Angmar: that he must sometimes rely only on his own strength and cleverness. Fili would not always be there to rescue him.

The two dwarves circled each other again, and Kili could see old Fror and the two trainees watching from the sidelines. He knew that Dwalin might have gone much harder on him than he did, but this was meant to be practice, a chance to display skill and technique to their young audience. There should be no question of winning, yet Kili found himself wanting a win. He was too afraid of their uncle to confront Thorin directly regarding his injustice to Betta, and for three days he had been held nearly helpless under Fror's watchful eyes, but here, at least, he might show some strength and strike a blow for Dis's sons.

With a cry, Kili leaped forward, throwing his shoulder into Dwalin on his weaker side. He was worn out, but had enough weight behind him that he drove his cousin off balance. Turning on his heel, he swung his axe into the back of Dwalin's leg and, to his amazement, the blow landed solidly with the flat of the blade striking just above the knee. Dwalin bellowed in surprise and indignation as he dropped to the floor, holding his thigh with one hand. If Kili had been using a proper axe against a proper enemy, he might have faced his blade outward and taken his opponent's leg clean off.

A little too eager to celebrate his victory, Kili stepped forward and reached out to touch his blade to Dwalin's neck, mimicking the killing blow. The next thing he knew, his cousin had wrapped his arm around both Kili's legs, knocking them out from under him and dropping him onto his back. And, with that, the battle was over. They both lay on the floor, laughing too hard to get up.

"Well, I hope that you two take your training more seriously than do these two fools," Fror muttered. He gave Kili a stern look before turning on the young dwarves who struggled to hide their own laughter behind their hands. Fror ordered them back to their blades.

Dwalin smiled at Kili behind Fror's back and nodded toward the armory. "Go on now," he whispered, "but you cannot hide from him forever in there."

Kili needed no further encouragement; he was on his feet and running out of the hall as quickly and quietly as he could go. The main door was still held against him, and he knew that Dwalin expected him to hide out behind the rows of hanging shields or duck into a corner to play some mischief upon Fror. His cousin thought that there was no other way out of the armory, but he did not know about the key.

"What will they think," Kili wondered, laughing to himself as he unlocked the heavy, iron door. The hinges were rusted but mercifully quiet as he eased it open and slipped through. "They will say that I have vanished."

He locked the door again behind him and set off at a swift jog down the passage. It would only be a few minutes before Fror realized that he was missing, but even if he guessed the means by which Kili had escaped, without his own key, the old dwarf would have to go around six rooms to get to the armory's forge, and by then Kili would be long gone.

He took the stairs two at a time, ignoring the curious looks of the few dwarves who saw him run past. He was heading for his own rooms and, once he reached that door, he darted inside and slammed it shut, pulling a heavy chest against it for safety. He leaned back against the wall, his breath coming quick, but he was still laughing.

Fror might beat his fists against that door until the iron swelled his knuckles like berries, but Kili would not answer him. It was the first time in three days that he had had a moment to himself to think, yet he knew that he had gotten off easy. For Fili, the hammer had come down hard. Kili might shirk his chores and tease Fror for his guard without worrying too much about it, but Fili have been given ten times the work in addition to his regular duties, and Fili was determined to prove himself to their uncle, to win back the favor that he had lost.

His brother was nearly sick with the struggle to appear perfect in Thorin's' eyes. His once ruddy cheeks had turned pale, and his eyes that used to be cheerful and bright – at least when he looked at Kili or Betta – were dull and lifeless, half lidded with dark circles hanging under them. He was exhausted, returning to their rooms too late to say more than good night before falling into bed, and yet he was still the first of them up the next morning so that he could leave early and get his work started.

It had been left up to Kili to make sure that they always had lumps of raw gold for Fili to pocket and trade during his rounds. His regular duties included keeping an eye on the mines and the miners down in the depths of the mountain, but while the brothers had been off having adventures in the north, Thorin had pushed to expand the mines, nearly doubling the length and breadth of the tunnels in only a few weeks. Anticipating the needs of an army, their uncle had hoped to increase Ered Luin's output of coal and raw ore. He hoped also, as always, that if they dug deeper, they might find some new vein of gold or silver, but there was little precious metal in those hills at that time and no new source to be found.

Fili's long days were spent walking the tunnels, up and down until his feet were swollen and he needed Kili's help to pull off his boots at night. If he had thought that the long walk through the snow-covered hills of Angmar had been hard, or the buried passages of the old Naug-home had been stifling, Fili learned better now. Each night, he returned, aching and exhausted, shaking his head and muttering under his breath: Thorin had grown the mines too quickly. The new walls were not firm and the bracings set too far apart. There was not enough time to build stone arches to support the weight of the mountain, but wooden beams must be brought in from outside and the expansion was meant to bring money _into_ the Dwarfhome, not send it out into the hands of Men. The Dwarves of Ered Luin had long ago cut all the good trees from this side of the mountain to feed their furnaces and build their early halls. The best wood came from the fields of the tall folk.

Today, Kili knew that his brother would be down in the mines again, though his presence there had little force with their uncle's anger upon him. Fili would pass through the forges, too, and even now might be standing in the refinery, dropping his lumps of raw gold onto the pile. He knew the weight of what he carried in his pockets and would take only that same weight in coin from the treasury later in the day. He might have taken coins from the mint, but freshly pressed gold would shine too brightly in Betta's hands.

It was a risk, going through so many steps when each one was a chance for someone to see or question them, but Kili knew that what Fili brought back at the end of each day was often less weight than what he had left behind. His brother refused to carry over the value of the coins, and if he put down even a fraction of an ounce less than the weight of a whole coin, he refused to take that coin and would not agree to take one more on the following day when the count came up light again.

They were losing out on this transaction, Kili knew, and though it undoubtedly eased Fili's guilt, he hoped that Betta would not suffer at the other end of it. He did not know what Fili thought. His brother refused to speak of her. He barely acknowledged Kili's words when he handed over the raw gold each morning and did not speak when he gave back coins at the end of each day. He would not talk of their adventures in the north and did not even look up when Kili said Betta's name. Was his brother indeed trying to forget their former guide? Certainly his sunken cheeks and dead eyes spoke of grief; was he grieving the woman who Thorin had declared was as good as dead to him?

Kili sighed and passed through the front room with their beds, entering the smaller of the two chambers beyond. He and his brother might have chosen to live anywhere in the mountain, but they needed little more than each other and had stayed in their childhood rooms, only expanding them a little with their own hands as they grew. One of the spare rooms was for weapons and armor, the brothers' own battle gear that they had yet to wear into actual battle; the other was for common items, their clothes and boots and a box of clasps for their hair and beards. A narrow shelf on one wall displayed the few toys that had survived their childhood, stone soldiers that their mother had carved for them and Fili's first wooden sword, split down the middle from a too eager thrust. Beside that shelf, the day after their return to Ered Luin, Kili had sunk two pegs into the stone and hung Betta's bow upon them. He took it down now and tested the string. The wood creaked under his hand; it was dry and needed tending.

Kili put back the bow. He could not believe that Fili would forget Betta in only a few days, and wasn't his brother still determined to pilfer the gold for her use? No, Fili might _say_ that it was best for them to move on, that they must obey Thorin's orders and never speak of her again, but if Fili did not think of her, then why was his behavior so strange? Both brothers had a secret, loose stone under their beds under which they would hide their treasures. Why did Fili insist that Kili keep Betta's gold coins under his? He had said, at the time, that Kili must keep them as he would be the one to eventually carry them out of the mountain, and – at the time – it had seemed reasonable enough.

Kili returned to the front room and eyed his brother's bed. Very reasonable, he thought, except that last night, after Fili had returned very late from his chores, Kili had been still awake in his bed and he had watched from under half-closed eyes as Fili removed the secret stone from under his bed and placed several secret somethings underneath.

This morning, Kili had kept careful watch while they dressed, but Fili guessed that he was observed and did not try to take out what he had hidden. It was possible that Fili had returned during the day while his brother was gone, but Kili felt sure that he would have had no chance, being kept as busy as he was. Whatever he had hidden must still be there.

He hesitated only a moment before deciding that Fili's right to secrecy lasted only as long as his health, and his health was failing fast. With curiosity weighing the argument on his side, Kili knelt down and thrust his hand under his brother's bed. He felt for the loose stone and lifted it up, pulling out the large bundle that was beneath it and sitting back on his heels.

He unwrapped the bundle and stared in surprise at what he had found. One of the green stones from Grahn's treasure chest was there, and several scraps of loose parchment folded together, but that was not what caught his eye. He held up to the lamplight a golden pendant half-formed. It had been scored in many places, the beginnings of a filigree design, and Kili recognized the notches along one side and a hook to hang the pendant on a fine chain. It was a gift for Betta, he had no doubt, but he was no goldsmith and could not yet guess what the finished product would be. For that, he unfolded the pages and looked over his brother's drawings.

A sketch had been made in charcoal pencil, rubbed out and redrawn many times over. The design was a fair mingling of Dwarvish knots and the Gondorian design that Kili recognized from Betta's inlaid mirror. She had told them that the mirror had been fashioned by her grandfather and gifted to her mother before it was passed on to her, but the curved lines of Fili's design formed a graceful tree growing up from the side of a mountain in such a way that its topmost branches formed the highest peaks of stone while the roots of the mountain itself became the roots of the tree.

Kili had not known that his brother had the skill to draw so delicate a design, and he might have imagined that Fili had ordered another dwarf to create it, but the perfect rows and columns along the side of the page, the measurements and calculated angles, were all written in the same deliberate hand that Fili used in his bookkeeping for Thorin. When his brother had found the time to work on this in only three days, Kili could not begin to guess. He put everything back where he had found it and replaced the stone, then sat down on his bed to puzzle out this new riddle.

It seemed clear enough that not all of Fili's late hours had been spent on Thorin's list of chores. And what was more, Kili knew that he had been right. Fili had not forgotten Betta or his love for her. This necklace was for her, made from the gold they had found in the north, and that also explained why Fili's delivery of coins from the treasury each night had been light. It was not healthy, this secret work and secret thought, but unless Thorin lessened his decree and took pity on his nephew, Kili feared that it would be himself and not Fili who delivered the pendant to Betta when it was finished.

No. He refused to let that happen. Fili was kept busy and watched every moment, but Kili was determined to find a way to slip his brother out of the mountain. Not today, certainly, and perhaps not for several days or weeks or more, but eventually Thorin's guard must falter. His eye would turn elsewhere and then…

Kili took the pouch of gold coins from under his bed. For now, he must be satisfied with making his own, much smaller delivery to Betta. He was well practiced at talking his way past the guards and Thorin had not ordered _him_ to stay within the mountain. He would make his way into town where he knew a friendly house with an innkeeper's wife who would be glad to trade a Dwarf coin or two for town money. He would have a pint at the pub and allow himself to be seen by dwarf eyes before making his way over the hill to Nan's cabin. The pint would allow him to trade another coin for small change and it would give him evidence if Thorin asked him where he had gone that day.

There would still be several gold coins in the pouch that Betta could not easily spend, but for that, he would trust to the cleverness of Nan and Gilon. He knew that they could keep her secret and would not reveal the source of their guest's sudden wealth.

Looking both ways before he left their rooms, Kili hurried toward a side door that he knew. He would slip out through the same south door in the Wall that he had long ago slipped Betta out of, and he looked forward to seeing his friend again.

* * *

**Yay, a new chapter! Please, pretty please, lovely new readers, REVIEW! I delight in your feedback and despise writing blind. If you liked something - or if you didn't - REVIEW!**

**Please :)**

**-Paint**


	8. A Different Love Story

**Middle-earth, and all who dwell within it, belongs to Tolkien. I am grateful to him for growing this beautiful garden in which our imaginations can play. Please review!**

* * *

Betta scowled at the needle and thread in her hand. She knew that she looked like a petulant child; Nan had told her so moments ago as she left the cabin. What did it matter how she looked, Betta thought bitterly, when there was no one to see her who cared? Her hand shook with anger and frustration as she struggled once more to guide the needle through the linen handkerchief.

"Ouch!"

How she had managed to stick her finger when she had only one hand in use was beyond her. She cast aside the embroidery ring (carefully, as she had once already found a way to stitch her skirt to the ring). She stared at the small drop of blood that stained her skin and sighed. Was this what she had come to, a broken woman, unable to do even the slightest task without help? What of her bow and knife? What had become of the woman who had slayed the snow-troll?

It was not that she _could not_ do the task that Nan had set her to, she insisted to herself. She had learned to sew like any other woman of Gondor and, after many trials and just as many errors, she had figured out how to hold the embroidery ring between her right arm and knee so that she might even sew one-handed. She had figured out, much to Nan's chagrin, that she might stick the sewing needle into the cushioned arm of her chair so that it stood upright while she ran the thread through the eye. She did not need help to do that!

No, Betta thought, it was not that she _could not_ embroider the squared handkerchief that Nan had given her, but that she _would not_. Not since the first day that she had taken her father's bow without his permission and climbed into the high hills above Losarnach to hunt the wild game had she willingly consented to do women's work. She might wield the needle out of necessity, to mend her torn clothes or to stich a net for her snares, but not for this. What use was there in embroidery? A fancy hem did not resist the mud any more than did a plain one, and there was no design among Men or Dwarves that would cause a linen cloth to wipe a spill or bind a wound better than it already did. What was the use in this?

She sighed and looked down at the abrupt end of her right arm. It was still capped with seal-skin, and she tightened the strap that bound the wrapping to her arm. Even Nan had been forced to admit that Elm had done good work there. And, Betta had to admit, Nan was right, and the sewing had done her some good. It taught her to steady her left hand, and it strengthened her left arm for the finer work that it was not used to doing. She no longer had a right hand to share the load, and her left must bear all the burden.

The injury had hardly troubled her while she travelled with Dwarves in Gloin's caravan. She had had other, more pressing, worries on her mind, and Fili and Kili had been there; but here, in Nan's cabin, the loss of her hand was a constant vexation to Betta. Every task she attempted was hindered by it. At first, Nan had allowed her to help with harder work: carrying wood and digging in the garden behind the house, but on the morning of the second day, Betta had hooked the handle of a too-heavy basket of roots over her right arm and carried it into the kitchen, not setting the basket down even when she felt a pain in her arm. Nan had unwrapped her bandages to find that the weight of the basket had torn open one of Betta's stitches to split and the not-yet-healed wound was bleeding freely again.

She had ordered Betta back to sewing and sitting again and refused to let her lift anything heavier than a glass of water. She swore that Betta would neither lift nor carry for three days, or until the wound had healed, whichever came the latest.

It did not good to argue with the dwarf-woman. Nan was adamant and Betta's complaints fell upon deaf ears, and now she sat beside the fire like an old woman, ruminating on the unfairness of the world. What good was an arm if it was too weak to be used? Better to have the whole limb cut off and be done with it, she thought angrily.

Betta left her chair and went to the window. She regretted her sharp words to Nan – the dwarf-woman had been nothing but kind to her, and she meant well enough – but she wished for the freedom she once had to wander the woods alone. The sun was bright and to the south-west, she could see the rising slopes of the Ered Luin, dark blue behind the green crest of the hill, but she did not look long at them. There had been no sight or sound from that quarter, no visit from Fili or his brother and no message sent. Neither Nan nor Gilon could give any news of what went on inside the mountain.

Unwilling to resign herself to the needle again, Betta took one of Nan's thick shawls down from its peg and pulled on Nan's heavy boots. Her own took too many laces and buckles to fasten for her to put them on easily with one hand. Betta left the cabin and left her bitter thoughts behind.

The cold air hit her hard in the face as soon as she opened the door. As she crossed the yard, it pulled at her skirt in a way that she did not like. Her old clothes, shirt and trousers, had been so patched-up and stained by her three years of wandering that Nan had taken them all away and left her own spare clothes in their place. This meant that she must wear a skirt that, even with the hem let down as far as it would go, stopped too high above her ankles. Nan was also much wider about the waist that Betta , and it took a long length of belt to keep all that cloth in place. Betta could not help but imagine how much harder her days in the north would have been if she had been forced to battle orcs and wolves as well as a skirt!

Slowly, Betta picked her way through the mud in the yard. Gilon's farmland sat between the rise of two steep hills and, though the cabin and barn had been built upon raised earth, the flat land between them sank down into the mud and was soaked with the melting snow. Betta moved carefully, taking care not to be seen by Nan, who was working in the garden behind the house. She still thought it strange to be harvesting vegetables in springtime when the ground was half-frozen, but Nan planted her winter carrots, beets and garlic in autumn and now that it was April, they must be dug up. The dwarf-woman had begun to teach Betta her herb-lore, too, though they had to make do with dried leaves and stems until winter released its grip and allowed the new greenery to grow.

Almost as soon as she left the cabin, Betta heard the ringing of Gilon's hammer coming from behind the barn. She followed the sound, and a blast of heat welcomed her into the forge. Leaving Nan's shawl beside the door, she stepped into the narrow stall between the work room and the lower floor where Gilon's anvil stood before the hot forge fires. The stall was for any horse or other animal who might need new shoes fitted, and it was the closest Betta could get without being ordered back. She stood there often, watching Gilon work. Today, he was beating into shape a long, rough iron blade. It was part of a plough, but in its present condition, she could not say what part.

Gilon wore thick, leather gloves to protect his hands, and the lower half of his face was covered with a leather apron to guard his beard from errant sparks. He saw movement out of the corner of his eye and looked up at the stall. He was not surprised to see Betta there. He winked at her and then returned to his work. She had been staying with them only a few days, but already she had taken to hiding out from her unwanted chores by slipping into the forge. Watching him work reminded her of Fili and Kili and how they had moved about the dwarf forge up in the mountains; she felt more useful bringing hammers and chisels to Gilon than she did wiping plates and sweeping floors with Nan.

After a few more blows, Gilon put aside his hammer and took off his mask. "You've escaped my wife again," he said, shaking his head, but his blue eyes were cheerful. "Well, hand me those tongs and stay well back from here."

Betta took the tool from the rack and handed it over the railing to him. She watched as he lifted up the hot, iron blade and thrust it back into the coolest part of the fire. She did not understand half of what he did and she wished to learn, but she had been called a child once already today and pestering Gilon with questions would only confirm that she deserved the name.

Seeming to guess both parts of her mind, Gilon answered her question without waiting to be asked. "It is a coulter," he said, "though I dare say you have seen one before."

"I have not seen one that looks like that," she said. "It is very large and strangely curved."

"Because the ground here is so hard," he explained. "And we plant our crops deep in spring. With the weight of a good ox to draw this before him, a farmer might cut through stone." He smiled. "But stone is still softer than the frozen ground, and the farmer who ordered a new blade from me should have known better than to try to break ground in early March.

"More work for you, then," Betta said.

"Indeed," he nodded, but his face was grim, "and I will take all the work that I am given, for I am not given much these days."

The windows of the forge looked north and east, and none showed the mountains to the west, but the shadow of Ered Luin hung over the whole of the farm. "Why be a blacksmith so near to so many dwarves?" Betta asked. "This place is not like Dunland where the Men and Dwarves live apart and do not willingly work with each other."

Gilon leaned his weight against the anvil. He crossed his arms and looked at her thoughtfully. "You have not been long in this land, and your loyalties lie in the west, I suppose," he said. "I of all Men cannot blame you for that, but although my family has farmed in these hills for many generations, it has only recently become our means for survival. Do your people have two names in Gondor?"

Betta shrugged. "Some do," she said. "My family did not. We had no need."

"Well, here, we do, though they are little used in a town where everyone knows everyone else. I am Gilon Smith, not Gilon Gardner or Gilon Farmer, and a smith I am. My grandfather was counted among the greatest blacksmiths this side of the Shire, but when he swung his hammer, there were only a few dwarves in the mountains, a wary bunch of vagabonds who did not take work from the tall folk - though they say that there used to be many more Dwarves of the bolder sort who lived there in ages past."

Gilon sat down upon the anvil, groaning as he forced his stiff, right knee to bend. "I was not yet born when Thrain's company came west over the mountains and resettled the Ered Luin. In my father's time, there was work enough for him, but for me, there is less and less each year. Even last summer, I might have counted on earning enough coin to feed my wife and myself, but overwinter, Thorin grew eager for gold. His dwarves now take in work that they would not otherwise have accepted, and his forges run hotter than mine. Since the new year began, I have had work only from a few farmers, Men who I would rather have refused for they do not trust dwarves and speak of my wife with many cruel words when they think I cannot not hear them."

He sighed. "But a man must work, and Nan cannot earn all our keep with her herbs. The land is not kind to those who are unfortunate enough to grow old."

Betta looked at him, searching his face. True, there were grey whiskers in his beard, but until today, she had not believed that he had seen above fifty years of life. Then again, she had grown used to gauging the passage of years against a Dwarf's long lifespan. Fili was more than eighty years old, but he fought with the vigor of a Man of twenty-five. Kili, too, was more than twice Betta's age, but she could not help seeing him as a lad younger than she.

"I wish that I could do something to help you," she said, looking down at her maimed arm. She could do little enough to help herself.

But Gilon shook his head. "You have given my wife something to do besides her work," he said. "That is good help. She wishes for a child, sometimes, I think, but she said that it would have been a curse to any child we had together. I could not have given her one even if I had met her twenty years before." He frowned, and then he laughed out loud. "I would have been a child myself!"

Betta did not laugh. If Gilon was as old as he claimed, then Nan still appeared quite young, and Betta wondered whether she would be so cheerful when the time came for her to whither while Fili remained strong and healthy. Would he love her as a grey-haired old woman or would he wish that he had married a dwarf-woman who might age as slowly as he did?

"How did you meet Nan?" Betta asked, hoping to draw her thoughts away from future grief. "Frei told me they came west together, and I did not think that dwarf-women mix much with the other races."

"They mix more often than you think," Gilon said. "In safer lands, some of them leave their mountains quite often, but they have no reason to announce themselves to us. As a younger man, I believed like many others that there _were_ no dwarf-women. I thought only of what I had seen with my own eyes, and there are Men in town even now who still say that the Dwarves breed with rocks in the mountains. They repeat the lie only because they are too stupid to ask their own wives and daughters… not that their wives and daughters would tell them the truth. I tell you that there is not a woman in town who does not know of my Nan, and half of them have been to visit her long before their wedding day. They don't tell their men when they come here… or why."

Gilon laughed again, and Betta forgave him the hint of scorn in his words. She knew that he did not laugh at the women and their secrets; his scorn was for the men who lived with them and were willfully blind to the nature of things. There had been no dwarf-woman dispensing her herbs in Lebennin, but the Easterling refugee women did not sell only ribbons and bracelets, and every small village that they did not visit had at least one old widow or granddame who had built herself a fine, lonely cottage with an herb garden behind.

"But you asked me how I met my wife," Gilon went on. "It was near twenty years ago now, and my heart was young enough to be susceptible to such feelings. I had taken a wagon of iron nails and tools into the farmlands east of town. My father spent his winters forging nails by the barrel-full out of scrap, and when there was no work for me at home, I would drive about and see who had a need.

"On this day, I had sold nearly all my stock, a handful here, a small sackful there, and collected a fair price for them all. I was on my way home, an hour from sunset and ten miles from town, when I came upon an overturned cart in the road. Two dark-skinned dwarves stood looking anxiously at the broken wheel and speaking strange words to each other.

"Had my father been with me, he would have ordered me to drive past, but I could see that these were foreign dwarves, and I was curious to know their story. Thrain's folk had been long in Ered Luin, and I feared another invasion of eastern Dwarves would destroy what business my father had left. I called out to them and stopped to offer my help.

"Of course, they did not trust me at first – nor for a very long time after – but I was a young man alone and had an empty wagon. More than that, I was willing and they had no other help coming. They told me that their horse had been spooked by a wild dog that had run out of a nearby field. The dog was in evidence; one of the dwarves had shot it with an arrow, but the horse had broken its ropes and fled. The wagon was overturned and its contents spilled into the ditch. The dwarves had recovered what they could, but being only two they could not leave their goods unguarded and neither one of them was willing to leave the other alone. They had been arguing for some time before I arrived, I guessed from their looks, and so they were willing to accept the service that I offered it. The more so when I asked for no payment.

"My wagon was empty of all but a few barrels. We loaded up their goods in good time and set off for the mountains. I had no suspicion that they were anything but what they said: two dwarf merchants who had traveled in caravan from the east, and who had left their larger company behind in order to visit their kin at Ered Luin. I did think it strange that two so strange-looking dwarves would have family in the west and said as much. I had seen no dwarves that looked as they looked. I spoke long and left many hints for them, trying to draw them into conversation and learn what was their true purpose, but… well, you know how tight-lipped a Dwarf can be."

Betta nodded. She thought it best not to tell him how early on in her own journey Kili had begun to speaking freely to her.

"Nan was more willing to talk than Frei, and she did admit that they had come from over Hithaeglir. That seemed a world away to me, a young apprentice who had never travelled farther than the boarders of the Shire. I liked the young dwarf-lad – as I thought Nan was then – even if his companion was silent. I drove them through town and right up to the Gates where other dwarves had been watching for them. I was given many thanks for my help, and by my new friend especially I was thanked. I rode home, thinking to myself that I had made a new friend. I even told him, before I left the Gates, that I hoped to meet him in a pub one day so that he might his thanks to me with ale!" Gilon's booming laugh echoed throughout the forge, and Betta could not help but join in at the thought of Nan wearing trousers and sharing a drink with the tall folk.

"_Did_ you meet her in a pub?" she asked.

Gilon shook his head. "I met her by chance a week later. I had gone to gather firewood in the woods above our farm, and Nan was there, foraging for her herbs, roots and bark. We met several times after and would talk together. I was very much surprised the day that she revealed to me that she was not a lad, but a lass! Though I suspect that she had already claimed me for her own,, and that was why she told me, but we were good friends at that time, and I needed little convincing."

"Indeed you did not," came Nan's voice from outside, "but your father needed more." She stepped though the doorway and into the forge. "Do not believe this tall man's tall tale," she told Betta. "He guessed that I was a woman long before I told him so, and he had no reason to be in those woods as often as he was when he met me. Who chops firewood in high summer!" She laughed. "But I did not come here to scold my husband or tell him that he should be working rather than spreading gossip to our guest. I bring you a visitor, Betta."

Nan stepped aside and Betta cried out in surprise and delight. She rushed out of the stall and into Kili's arms. He stood in the doorway and laughed as he held her, taking care not to crush her injured arm between them. After a moment, he pushed her back and said, still laughing, "Wait a moment, step back! Let me have a look at you. I am astonished!"

Betta looked down at herself in confusion. "What now? I have not changed in three days."

"But you have," he insisted. "I would have bet pure gold that nothing could convince you to put on a dress. And your hair! Do you know, I half suspected that it would be yellow once all that dirt was washed away? Indeed, you have changed, and I nearly mistook you for one of the tall folk-women from town. I would have if it were not for those muddy boots and that you smiled so wide when you saw me."

He was still laughing, but Betta's cheeks flushed hot with embarrassment, and she tugged uncomfortably at the heavy skirt. "My trousers were torn up by the journey," she said. "There were no other clothes for me to wear…"

"He is only teasing you," Nan said, interrupting them and giving Kili a sharp look. "No one could mistake you for one of those girlish creatures from town. You are as study as a farm lass and twice as fair, but you have got my boots full of mud, and I will not be the one to clean them tonight!"

"I'll clean them," Betta said quickly, but she was staring at Kili and had hardly taken her eyes off him since he first appeared.

It had been only three days since she had seen him, but he seemed new in her eyes as if a lifetime had passed. Kili, too, had changed out of the tattered travel clothes that he had worn and into a fine, new shirt and coat. He wore no sword at his belt or bow on his back, but she thought that she saw the hilt of a knife or two hidden. As changed as he was, seeing him again was proof to her that her adventures in the north had not been a dream. And if Kili were here, then Fili must be…

Kili saw her look suddenly toward the door, and his smile faltered. He shook his head. "I am afraid that my brother was too busy to come visiting today. Our uncle keeps him hard at work under the mountain, but he sends his good wishes, and this. It is only a little of what was promised to you, but the rest is sure to follow."

He took the small purse from his pocket and handed it to her. It was heavy and jingled with the sound of many coins. Betta stared at it, and Kili half expected her to refuse the gift or argue that it was too much, but she did neither. She turned and held it out to Gilon.

"This is yours," she said, "not mine. If I cannot work, at least now I might pay you in money for all that you have given me."

But Gilon crossed his arms and would not take it. "What we have given you, we gave without thought of payment. The money is yours and yours alone. We do not need it."

"We shall see about that," Nan said. She took the purse from Betta's hand and shuffled a few of the coins out onto her palm. It was not for her own sake; Kili knew that the dwarf-woman could have told the value of the purse from the weight and sound of it alone. No, Nan turned her hand toward Betta, letting the light of the forge fires play over the bright gold and tarnished silver.

"You'll be able to pay for your own things with your own coin, now," Nan said to her. "You might buy clothes to your own liking, though I'll not object if you decide to spend a bit on sugar or candles for the farm." She poured the coins back into the purse and dropped the purse into the deep pocket of Betta's borrowed skirt. "But if you would have my advice, you will put most of it aside and keep it safe. Who knows what needs you might have in future days?"

Kili was grateful to Nan for her prudence. It was Betta's money to do with as she pleased, but he knew that Fili would not like to hear that she had given it all away. He kept his thoughts to himself and said only, "I am sorry that I could not change more of it for town money. It could be dangerous for Betta to spend gold coins. Many Dwarves have seen her face, and they will wonder where she got the money…"

Gilon smiled. "As for that, no Man or Dwarf would ask why Gilon has gold coins," he said. "I trade with many merchants on the road and, like any man, I buy my coal and ore from Dwarves."

Kili nodded. Betta still stood close to him, and she looked at him anxiously. "How is your brother?" she asked. "How is it with your uncle?"

Kili hesitated. He had much to say on that subject, but he did not like to speak of family business with Nan and Gilon listening. He might have told Betta but she did not need any more troubles than she already had.

"Thorin is still angry," he said, "and we are worked very hard, but much of it would have been waiting for us anyway. We have been gone for many weeks, remember, and many things were left undone in that time. Indeed, as much as I would wish to stay, I have tarried long enough and must get home before I am missed."

He smiled at Betta and put his hand on her shoulder. "I am glad to see you are safe and well." His eyes drifted to her right arm, but he did not ask about that. "I will see you again. Good day." He bowed to Nan and nodded to Gilon.

"I will walk with you to the hill," Betta said. Kili did not object, and the two of them walked together out of the forge. Betta did not see the sad look in Nan's eyes or the way that Gilon shook his head as he put his arm around his wife.

Betta walked with Kili through the muddy yard, through the farm gates and up the road toward the hill. The sun was falling toward the western horizon, and the sky seemed dimmer than before, but the cold wind did not feel so bitter to her now that she had Kili beside her. He spoke lightly of the mountains, of the work that he did there and the careful watch that had been kept upon him and his brother in recent days.

"I think that Thorin fears that we will up and disappear again if he lets us out of his sight," he said with forced cheer. "He cared little enough while we were gone, but now that we are back under his thumb, he is determined to keep us there."

"Then he will take you both with him to… into the east?"

"He has not yet decided on that, but it is only a matter of time." Kili looked up at the hillside. "Look at all this green grass! Is it Spring already?"

Betta sighed and did not press him with more questions. He had grown close again, begin back among Dwarves, though his smile was as open and friendly as it used to be.

They reached the bottom of the hill and stopped at the place where the road began to slope up the steep path. Betta stood in front of Kili and looked into his face. "There is something you are not telling me," she said, searching his eyes, "something that you would not say when Nan and Gilon could hear it. You hardly speak of your brother at all. What has happened in the mountain? Is Fili not well? Why did he not come here with you?"

"Fili could not come. I told you that," Kili said, unable to meet her gaze. "He is well enough, though he could be better if Thorin would relax his grip on our time. He works Fili too hard and he…" He sighed and looked at her. He saw the worry in Betta's wide eyes and knew that he could not tell her the truth. "My brother is well. More than that, I cannot say. I no longer know with any certainty what is in his heart. I have not known for some time now, not since he gave it to you."

Betta's face fell, and Kili's heart ached to see her suffer. But still, he told himself, her cheeks were red and she was gaining back the weight that she had lost in the north, not like Fili who was pale and seemed to waste away with every passing day. Betta's eyes were sad, but they were not sunken and lost as Fili's eyes looked now.

"Frei said that I should forget him. She says it would be better for him if I did."

"And what do you say, Betta?"

She shook her head. "I cannot," she said. "Not even if Fili came here himself and swore that he would never see me again. Not even if he forgot me could I forget him…" She looked at Kili and smiled sadly. "Perhaps I _am_ like a Dwarf, as you and your brother so often have said. I have given my heart away and am too old to grow another for another man. Tell Fili that if he will not come to me, then I will find some way to go to him. And if neither can be done, then at least he must consent to send his brother to keep me company. I am lonely here, Kili. I miss my friends."

"Fili could not come to you today," Kili said. "He may not come for many days, but he has not forgotten you." He did not tell her of the golden pendant or of the many hours that Fili had already spent laboring over it for her. "I will bring you more money when I can, for there is much gold that is owed to you, even if Thorin will not pay it." He smiled and took her hand. "I will bring my brother to you," he promised. "I do not know how or when, but I will find a way."

He pressed her hand and then turned his back and started up the hill. At the top, he looked back, but the road was deserted and the farmyard empty of all but a few goats and chickens. Betta had gone.

* * *

**Oh, wow, can you believe that it's December already? Almost time for BoFA! And almost two whole years since I started writing these stories. ****REVIEW! Share the love. I know that there's a comment burning a hole in your keyboard, just waiting to be typed ;)**

**-Paint**


	9. Down In The Mines, Up Above Ground

**Middle-earth, and all who dwell within it, belongs to Tolkien. I am grateful to him for growing this beautiful garden in which my imagination can play. Please review!**

* * *

Fili stood on the floor of the mineshaft, leaning back against the wall; he raised his eyes to the ceiling. Many lanterns were strung upon ropes reaching up and down the encircling walls, huge globes of blown glass with long wicks floating in clean-burning oil. They shone with lights pale blue, dark red and vibrant orange; but the roof of the cavern nearly a quarter of a mile above seemed to burn with the reflected fires of Ered Luin's largest forge.

Though Fili could not see the forge from where he stood, he knew it was there, perched on the ledge at the top of the mineshaft. And he knew that the mineral-laced oil, the lights, all of it served a purpose. The colors were not merely pretty, but the result of burning trace minerals that the dwarves took out of the deepest pockets of the earth and mixed into the oil harvested from underground wells nearby. The colors of the lights lined the paths of the lifts and could be used as guides should the mines ever need to be evacuated quickly. Dwarves, by their nature, had an uncanny sense of direction underground, but even a dwarf could lose himself in a panic or after breathing in the fumes of a gas leak. The lamps were useful, but still, they were beautiful, and Fili savored this rare moment of calm in his busy day.

A loud whistle pierced his ears, bringing him back to the work at hand. The lunch-hour was over and the miners were returning from their midday meal. Four lifts brought down the dwarves who had gone home to their families while the rest marched out in long lines from the next cavern over. More than one hundred dwarves appeared and filled the floor that moments ago been empty of all but Fili. They were still covered in the dust from the morning's digging and marched willingly back into the tunnels with their picks and shovels thrown over their shoulders, their candle-hats upon their heads. Some of them laughed, many of them sang, and one or two nodded to Fili as they past. Fili nodded to each group's foreman, and noted down which tunnel they entered.

As the last dwarves were passing, one group in particular caught his eye. Three gangs of a dozen dwarves apiece, their colored armbands marking them as hewers and colliers, had separated from the main crowd and were marching toward the south tunnel.

Fili hurried forward. The long lines of dwarves parted for him, and he caught hold of the foreman before he entered the tunnel. "Your dwarves are needed in the Northwest, Gani, not here," he said, but the old dwarf shook his head.

"My orders say South, Master Fili," he answered, bowing as politely as he could. He took a paper from his breast pocket.

"What orders?" Fili frowned. The South tunnel was old and in ill-repair. If it was to be used at all, it needed bracers and builders, not diggers and stone-breakers. He took the page from Gani's hand and read it. "Thorin orders you there?" he said, not quite believing it. "He did not tell me."

"I was only given the order today as I was setting out from home," Gani answered, tugging anxiously at the whistle that hung around his neck. "I believe that Master Thorin has been reading the old reports. I have heard that he thinks he has found an undiscovered lode of silver down there." He shook his head. "The sniffers were sent in this morning with their rods and chisels, and I suppose they must have found some clue…"

"That tunnel was built in Thrain's time," Fili said sharply. "They found nothing of worth, and it has been abandoned for years." He looked at the carts that Gani's gang was drawing into the south tunnel. "It is two hundred yards long, as I recall, and you have hardly timber enough for twenty."

"Wood is scarce these days," Gani agreed, shrugging his shoulders. He knew as well as any dwarf that it was the cost of the wood and not its supply that prevented them from getting more. "I am sorry, Master Fili, but this order comes from Thorin himself, and I must follow my lord's orders as written."

Fili clenched his fist in his pocket. It was just like Thorin to give his own orders and not bother to tell Fili about it. He still thought that his nephew was a young lad who needed watching over, and that his work in the mines was a chore to keep him busy, a task to train him up as heir with no real responsibility. Fili knew that their adventures in the north had not done anything to dissuade Thorin of the opinion, but still, he should have been told.

He read over Thorin's order with a careful eye. "Follow your orders then, Gani," he said with anger creeping into his words, "but go slowly. There is nothing here that says you cannot go slowly. Brace up the tunnels with fallen stone if you must, and set two dwarves to a pick so that one might watch the fault lines while the other digs. That will not go against the letter of your lord's written order, and if Thorin complains, you send him to me."

He turned away, leaving Gani pale and shaking. The old dwarf was a clever miner with a good head for stone, but he was not brave and did not have the nerve to send Master Thorin anywhere that Master Thorin did not care to go. But he did not dare to question Fili's orders, either. Gani followed his gang down into the South tunnel, shaking his head and muttering to himself. If it were not for the other dwarves under his supervision, he might have preferred being caught in a tunnel-collapse to being caught between this angry nephew and his uncle.

.

After he had seen the afternoon crews down into the tunnels, Fili joined a load of coal being lifted out of the mine. He helped to hook the chains to the four corners of a waiting cart, then hooked his heel onto the lip of the wheel well and held on with one hand. The foreman flashed his lantern up at the waiting dwarves above and the huge, grinding gearwheels began to turn.

Almost as fast as he could blink, Fili was up in the air and speeding toward the top of the mineshaft. The coal cart itself would be raised to the ceiling, swung around upon a long arm, and then sent sliding down a woven rope of iron through a fissure that led across the mountain to a cavern where many stone bins had been carved. The coal would be emptied into a bin and the cart swung round and brought back empty. Fili meant to jump off long before the coal was dumped. The carts were brought up close to the ledge that led to the forge, and he often rode this way rather than waiting for one of the manual lifts to be sent down.

Today, however, he wondered whether he should not have taken the slower ride. The ledge was fast approaching, and he braced himself to step off. It was not a difficult jump to make for a young dwarf in his prime, and Fili had never troubled himself over it before. But today, he was tired, and his knees ached. He felt older than his years as the weight of his body pulled him down, and the swaying motion of the cart made his head spin. He put his free hand out to steady himself on one of the corner chains. This, too, was not safe. All it took was a moment and a sudden twist of the cart to catch a dwarf's fingers between the heavy iron links. Prince Fili did not need to worry about being drawn along with the cart and dumped into the coal bin where he would be dead before he was missed, but the chains did not care for prince or pauper and they would take his finger off just the same.

The cart was swept up past the ledge, and Fili stepped off. He landed safely as he had a hundred times before, but took a moment to steady his feet and his head, stomping the former to get the feeling back into his toes and shaking the latter at himself for his fearful thoughts. He looked back over his shoulder and watched the cart that he had ridden still swaying back and forth as it was sped into the darkness of the fissure. Next time, he would take the lift.

Fili walked across the apron and up to the forge surveying the work that was being done there. A dozen dwarves stood around the several fires, some hammering, some sorting, and some smelting ore. The heat of the place welcomed him as he stepped under the domed archway, and he sighed, remembering a time when the pounding of the hammers was the beating of his heart and its heat was the heat of his blood; these days, being inside the mountain felt more like wearing an old shirt that he had outgrown. As he walked around the forge, noting down quantities half-heartedly with a pen, he thought of the huge forges of Erebor that Thorin had often described; a dozen of them altogether, and each one ten times larger than the largest forge in Ered Luin. Fili imagined thick veins of gold, as wide as his arm, and lodes of precious ore like small mountains themselves. He felt his heart stir at the thought of mining those tunnels and fashioning what they found into great works of beauty, seeing the long halls filled with bright light.

He shook his head and shook the thoughts away. Was this, then, his uncle's true sickness: not a madness but a longing for greater things? Thorin had seen them, the forges and the halls. He had watched the gold flow through his hands. Miners and crafters, they each had their own work to fill their hearts and keep them busy, but Thorin's work was the work of a King. Was it really so strange that he dreamed of wealth and conquest and the reclamation of a lost kingdom over all else?

Fili looked around and saw that he was not watched. He made his way to the gold bin against the wall and looked over the edge. It was only half-full of small and impure nuggets, and it made him sad to think that he could not add to the wealth of the mountain and make his uncle proud of him again.

With an eye for the few dwarves near enough to see him, he put his hand in his pocket and drew out the several lumps of raw gold that Kili had given him that morning. He tipping them gently into the bin, pretending that he meant only to rest his hand upon the lid. The weight of just under seven coins dropped from his fingers; he would take six coins when he went next to the treasury, and that would make up for the last of the gold that he had kept to himself for Betta's pendant.

Would she mind, he wondered, that he had held back some of the money that she was owed in order to fashion a trinket for her to wear? Would she not rather have the coins to buy food and clothing? Betta was a practical woman but she had no tendency toward greed. He did not think that she would mind.

"Fili! Ho there, you!"

He jerked his hand back from the bin. The last lump of gold had long ago left his fingers, and there was no more to find in his pockets if he were searched. But who called out? Who had seen him? He had been watching the whole of the forge.

"Fili!" The voice came from behind. He turned and saw old Fror hurrying towards him from a far door that he had not thought to watch. No one should be coming from there. "There you are, Fili, but where is your brother!?" Fror demanded, looking around as if he expected to find Kili hiding behind one of the bins.

Fili looked around, too. For a moment, his fear warred against his better judgment, and if it had been Thorin shouting at him, he might have confessed all immediately and begged for forgiveness. But this was only a nervous and disheveled Fror, asking for Kili. Why?

"He is not here. What do you expect?" Fili said. He was as angry with Fror as his brother was for the watch the old dwarf had kept on them, and now that he had his wits back, he found that he did not like the familiar tone that Fror had taken with them since their return from the north. This shouting across rooms was the worst insult of all.

"He disappeared from the training hall," Fror said, still looking around. "You have not seen him?"

"I have work to do," Fili answered, waving him off. "_You_ are meant to be nurse-maiding my brother. Do you think I should do your job for you? If you cannot keep an eye on your charge, then my uncle should find a better spy."

"_Spy_!" Fror cried. His cheeks were red with indignation and his voice cracked in his throat. "It is not _I_ who lost my uncle's trust," he said, keeping his voice low so that he would not be overheard by the dwarves in the forge, but still, the words cut through Fili like an orc's blade. "It was not _my_ eye that wandered outside our own halls…" Fror hissed.

Fili's fingers ached from the fist he made, but he kept his hand in his pocket. He would rather have struck the old dwarf down, but his look was hot enough to melt iron, and Fror backed away from him with his hands held out in submission.

"F-forgive me, Master Fili, I did not mean to…"

"But you have no uncles left, old friend," Fili said with sarcastic good cheer, "and your eye has wandered far enough for long enough that my brother was able to get out from under it. Perhaps Kili has gone down to town to flirt with the women of the alehouses? If he has, then I hope that my uncle will not get wind of it. He will wonder where _you_ were when it happened."

"Gone to town?" Fror muttered. "Yes, of course, he's gone to town! I apologize, Master Fili, if I have troubled you. Please, excuse me."

Fror ducked away and hurried out of the forge without looking back. Fili sighed. It was just like Kili to run off and leave a mess for his brother to clean up. Undoubtedly, Kili _was_ in town, drinking his ale in the pub, but he had no interest in the tall-folk women. He would be trading tales of the north with other dwarves who had never been there. Kili had talked of changing some of Betta's gold coins for town money; if he had done that, and gone to visit her…

Fili looked around the forge. He made sure that all was as it should be and then slipped out through the same door that Fror had left by. He knew that no one would miss him for the quarter of an hour that it would take for him to run up to his room and slip Betta's pendant from under its stone. Kili had been watching too closely for him to bring it away with him that morning.

"I must find a better place for it," Fili muttered to himself as he hurried up the passage. "Somewhere I might get at it without his pestering me with questions."

It was heavy work to hold his love for Betta secretly in his heart and yet keep silent. But how could he be certain that once his lips were freed to speak her name with Kili that it would not loosen his tongue among other dwarves as well? And, once spoken, his words would certainly be carried straight to Thorin.

No, he could not risk it. As little freedom as they had now, it was still more than Thorin would allow if he suspected that his nephew had not bent to his will and forgotten the woman. Even Kili, innocent of the crime and the only one of them who Thorin had even hinted at bringing to Erebor, would be caught up in their uncle's anger.

Fili knew that he must stay silent, and that the pendant must be a secret, too. He could not go knocking down insolent old dwarves, however biting were the insults they threw at him. If there was even a chance that he or Kili might join the march to Erebor, then Thorin must be kept in the dark. He must not know that his nephew and heir still loved a human woman.

.

Fili's anger would have been much appeased if he had known that even as Fror was hurrying down the mountain along the road to town, Kili was making his way up the hill from Nan's farm. He took the path along the crest of the hill, and the two would miss each other by a mile, leaving old Fror to waste over an hour in searching the town and questioning every dwarf there whether he had seen Thorin's nephew. Kili arrived home long before Fror returned, footsore and despairing. He was sitting in the Great Hall talking with Gimli and Gloin and their other cousins who had come recently to Ered Luin when Fror burst in and accused him of escape.

How could he have escaped if he was here now? Kili asked, the picture of innocence as he insisted that he had never _deliberately_ slipped his watch. Really, he cried, how could Fror think that! Once Kili had realized that he was free of his unwanted guard, how could he _not_ take advantage and nip into town for an ale and a bit of news? It was really too much to expect of him, that he would suffer under guard for three whole days and then to _guard himself_ when Fror's watch finally failed?

And what was more, Kili went on in dismay, here was Fror blaming _him_! As if it were _his_ fault that the old dwarf had spent so long searching the town when he might just as easily have waited at home for Kili to return. It would have saved them both a great deal of frustration.

By the end of this speech, the other dwarves in the hall were applauding and Dwalin was thumping his mug on the table. Kili bowed low to them. Fror was purple with anger, and he certainly _did_ blame Kili for the trouble he had caused, but when even Gloin was chuckling at him from behind his beard, Fror could not shout any longer. He sat down and accepted the ale that was brought to him, sulking and stewing his anger in silence. He knew that he could not carry his complaints to Thorin without admitting that he had failed in his watch, and Fili's sharp words in the forge had reminded him that, however angry Thorin might be with his sister-sons, they were his nephews still, and Kili had always been the favorite son of Dis.

Fror had lost this battle, but it was lucky for Kili that he did not suspect that his charge would pay a secret visit to Betta at Nan's cabin. In the old dwarf's mind, it was only Fili who must be kept away from that bothersome female. If Fror had thought for even a moment that Kili had spent the afternoon at Nan's farm, he would have been forced to confess his suspicions to Thorin, and the whole mountain would have shaken with the shouts of rage that would have echoed up and down its halls once Thorin had heard that!

But of course, Fror did not suspect and Thorin was not told. No arguments broke out over dinner that night, or for many nights after, and the Durin family continued on in an uneasy, quiet peace.

.

In Nan's cabin, however, Betta had no such peace. She suffered the pains of Kili's brief visit, and after bidding him farewell at the base of the hill, she had returned to the cabin and retreated into her room to play over and over the very little that he had told her of Fili. The room itself had been cleaned and aired, dusted and fitted up with a bed. Though there were still a few barrels and sacks of coarse flour, and one or two stealthy cobwebs hiding in corners, it was her own room, and she sat alone in it until the sun sank behind the mountains and Gilon came in from the forge.

Nan was in the kitchen, chopping winter carrots at the table, and she looked up when her husband stomped in through the door.

"Well, you two make a pair, don't you," Nan cried, "both of you leaving muddy prints across my floor!"

Gilon bowed low to her in Dwarf fashion and stayed low as he reached down to take off his boots. "I shall build you a wide front porch, my lady," he said, "with a golden bench where your unruly guests might leave off their filthy shoes and save your marble floors. Will that satisfy you?" Wearing only his wool stockings, he padded across the floor. His large feet made almost as much noise as they had in heavy boots. He bent down to kiss his wife.

"I am satisfied," she said, "though the state of our guest leaves me less so."

Gilon looked toward the closed door of Betta's room and shook his head. "The young prince made quite an impression on her today," he said.

"But it's his brother she loves, and who claims to love her," Nan reminded him. "So, why did the brother not come to visit?"

"There is trouble in the mountain," Gilon said, his good cheer failing him. "Men are whispering in town, though you must swallow their words with a barrel full of salt. One Man hears from another Man who claims to have overheard two Dwarves talking. They say that Thorin is unhappy."

"Men talk too much." Nan rolled a lump of dough out onto the table and began to knead it down with her fists. "They cannot know what goes on in the mountain, and they are so caught up with the idea of Kings that they invent tales to keep themselves amused. But Dwarf Kings are worse that dull when you meet them in their own halls."

"Maybe so, but we have heard some of it from his nephew's own mouth." Gilon knew little of the long tale that Betta had told to Nan, but he was as clever as his wife and kept his ears and eyes open. "Will you speak with her? I can finish this."

"Do not touch my bread! Not until you've washed the dirt from your hands!"

Gilon washed his hands until the white of his skin was red from rubbing and the water was black with dust. The bread was in the oven by then, but he took up the knife to finish filling the stew pot with potatoes and dried meat. Nan filled a mug with milk from the jug and knocked on Betta's door.

A small sound answered her, and she entered without waiting for an invitation.

Betta sat on the edge of her bed with Nan's shawl still wrapped tight about her shoulders (though she had left her muddy boots by the door). There was no stove or fireplace in the small room, but Gilon had promised her one if she stayed through to next winter. They had piled her mattress high with spare quilts and added extra stuffing to the leaking corners of the window frame while winter's chill lasted.

Nan set the milk down on a small table near the bed. In Betta's hand were several of the coins that Kili had left and on the mattress beside her lay the purse. Nan sat on the other side of Betta and put her arm around her guest. Almost immediately, she wished that she had brought hot tea instead of milk.

"You're shivering, girl! Is it as cold as that in here?"

Betta shook her head. "I seem to feel the cold much worse these days," she said. "Ever since I fell into the frozen river…"

"Well, we can't have that, not while you've still got healing to do. I'll speak with that husband of mine and see if we can't fit you up something warm, a basin of coals, perhaps, until a stove can be found."

"No, an extra blanket would be enough. It will be summer soon," Betta told her. "Please, do not trouble yourself over me. I do not complain. It is only a passing thing, and when I order my new clothes, I will ask for thicker stuff." She tried to smile, but Nan was not fooled.

"You are thinking of that dark-haired dwarf who visited us this afternoon," she said, shaking her finger, but Betta only looked confused.

"What, Kili?" she shook her head. "No, or if I did, it was also a passing thing. I have been thinking of the sea and the warm southern coasts of Gondor."

Nan was silent. She knew little of coasts, southern or anywhere else. She had never left the Dwarfhome at Orocarni until she agreed to ride west with Frei, nor had she ever looked east from the slopes of those mountains toward the treacherous waves beyond. Nan knew as little as her husband of the doings in Gondor or the great kingdoms of Men in the south. She had little desire to learn more.

Betta had seen many coasts and many mountains, too. She sighed.

"My mother used to tell me of sailors' wives in Linhir who would sit on their porches and look out to sea while their men were away. They would sit there, she said, waiting for them to return. And sometimes, when a man was lost, his wife would sit there still and stare for days or weeks on end. If she had no family to care for her, she might spend her life waiting and die in that chair." Betta squeezed her hand tight around the coins until their edges cut into her palm. "I never thought that their fate would be my own, that I would live only to wait on another."

"Who says that you must?" Nan asked, indignant.

"But what else will I do here? Shall I take in washing and sewing when I hate so much to hold the needle? I might have done it if it was that or starve, but I have money now, enough for all that I could need. I must find work that I want." She balanced the purse in her lap and carefully dropped the coins into it one at a time from her hand. "A rich woman is good for little more than being rich, and Gilon says that I cannot be a blacksmith."

Nan laughed out loud. "No, you cannot be that, little thing that you are. You wouldn't want to do it, anyway, though the heat from a forge might keep you warm. You are right, and there is little good work for an unmarried woman in these parts. But you were raised on a farm and know the work of one…" She frowned and was thoughtful for a moment.

"I dare say that I will outlive you, my girl, and I will certainly outlive my husband." She sighed. "Gilon does not like me to speak of it, but it has been on my mind in recent years. He is getting old and was the only child of his parents. I will inherit this farm from him, of course, but after I have buried my husband in the earth – a silly custom, but there it is – I mean to go up into the mountains and live among Dwarves once again."

"Will they take you in?"

"They will not cast me out." Nan made a face. "We shall see how long I can stomach their pity and play the penitent widow, but I think it would be good to be able to escape their scorn now and again and come and visit you here…"

"What, me here? But that is years from now!"

"Twenty years at least, I hope," Nan agreed, "but who else would I give this house and this land to? Some greedy farmer from town looking to add to what he already owns? Will you not do this favor for an old dwarf-woman? Can I not call you daughter?"

Betta stared at her in surprise. First Kili had arrived unexpectedly, bearing what was to her a mountain of gold in his hands, and now Nan was offering her a farm, the forge and all the lands around her if only she would consent to live upon them. What was more, she offered Betta a family. It was too much and she had no words to accept or refuse the gift.

"Now, I won't have you answering me right away," Nan said quickly. "I know that your heart is set elsewhere, but if you must spend your days waiting, why not do something with your time? You'll work here, learning the ways of our farm. I might send you into town for my shopping instead of always waiting for Gilon to need something for the forge. I can keep an eye on that arm of yours, and I'll teach you my own trade, all the herb lore that this old head holds... even the secret lore of the Blacklock Dwarves," she said, leaning forward with a wink. "I'll teach you to sooth cramps and stop bleeding, how to birth a babe and how to end one that's not wanted. It will be hard work for you, with only one hand, but you are used to hard work, I think."

"Yes, I am," Betta agreed. She felt as if a weight had been lifted off her shoulders. It could be a long while before she knew how things would play out in Ered Luin and at Erebor. She could wait for Fili and yet not be idle. And if it happened that Thorin conspired to keep his nephew forever under his thumb, at least she would have a life without him - a poor life, but a life nonetheless. If it was that Fili hurried back to her only to say that they must flee to far lands to escape his uncle's wrath, then she would have money saved up to supply them. And if fate would have Fili die in the east…

Betta refused to think of that. She squeezed the dwarf-woman's hands. "Thank you, Nan," she said. "You have eased my mind and raised my spirits beautifully, but I must warn you, by my mother's report, I am a terrible student."

Nan laughed. "We shall see about that. Now, come. I left my husband in charge of the stew, and by now he has undoubtedly burned a hole through my best pot."

They left Betta's room together and went into the kitchen. Nan took over with the cooking while Betta set the plates on the table. Gilon retired to his chair by the fire and sat smoking his pipe, resting his aching knee after a day's hard labor. He would have stood at the table all night if Nan asked, but she did not ask. Betta listened to them laughing at each other across the wide room, and she wondered how differently her life would have been, how much happier her childhood, if her mother had been as content in her marriage as these two were in theirs.

Alone again in her room that night, she thought of Fili alone in his mountain. She hoped that Kili had better words with which to comfort his brother than those he had given to her.

* * *

**Whew! Another chapter done and gone! And it's so good to see a few familiar names popping up again. Hello, you all! It makes it much easier to get this all out with your kind words to encourage me. Especially after I had such a terrible, stress-filled week at work, and this next week won't be any better. Oh, well.**

**I hope you all enjoyed the brief glimpse of Fili at his job. I'd hate to have him for my boss, but then, I write (a lot of) this when I should be working ;)**

**Thank you! Review! And, thanks.**

**-Paint**


	10. A Quiet Council

**Middle-earth, and all who dwell within it, belongs to Tolkien. I am grateful to him for growing this beautiful garden in which my imaginations can play. Please REVIEW!**

* * *

The days passed slowly in town as winter became spring and the weather grew warm and wet. It would be a mild summer, all the old men agreed, prone to rainy weather that stopped up the joints. With luck there would not be so much rain that the fields were flooded or the fruit trees swamped. At Nan's farm, Betta had discovered a huge, dusty sack in the pantry full of heirloom seeds in a dozen rainbow colors. Even Gilon did not remember what plants they had come from. During the evening hours, she would sit at the table with as many bowls and plates as she could find and sort them out, wondering aloud why they had never been planted and declaring her determination to try them out this season. While she spoke aloud to herself, Nan and Gilon would sit in their chairs by the fire, shaking their heads and smiling to each other.

Another day passed, and then another. It was almost two weeks since Betta, Fili and Kili had stumbled back to Ered Luin as part of Gloin's wagon train. Three times or more, Kili had snuck out of the Dwarfhome and showed up unexpectedly at the farm. Most visits, he brought gold and silver coins, and when he did not have gold, he carried with him kind looks and evasive words: Fili was well, Thorin was angry, and no more could be said about that.

Betta accepted that _he_ would not speak of his brother, but that did not mean that she could not. In the warm afternoon, they walked together in the fields; at first she had held Kili's hand and spoken of Fili, but she knew little and there was only so much that she could say of old times. On his second visit, and ever visit after that, they spoke less and less of Fili because it made her sad and him uncomfortable. Instead, they talked of farm work and iron work, of growing things and Gilon's blacksmithing. Kili smiled to himself and corrected her on what she did not know, at least about the ironwork. He gave her gifts, a stone bracelet cut from fine, gray quartz and a silver clasp for her hair, saying that they came from Fili. He noticed that the locks on the right side of her head that his brother had shaved back weeks ago were now nearly all grown back; it was only a keen eye that could tell which had been cut.

The silver clasp was one of Fili's own, but the bracelet had belonged to their mother, Kili told her, as he slipped it onto her wrist. Fili wanted her to have it and asked Kili to deliver it because he could not, so Kili said. Betta was not convinced that Fili actually had sent these gifts. Why send her a bracelet when he might have written his regards on a page and sent her that. He knew that she could read.

She thanked Kili for the present just the same. If it had been their mother's, then she could not refuse it. She said whatever she could think of to keep him with her when he visited, but he could rarely stay for more than an hour at a time, insisting that he must go and it was too great a risk he would be missed from the mountain. Betta walked with him to the road and up to the foot of the hill where he held her hand and bid her farewell, and then he left her and she returned to the cabin to added the coins that he had brought her to the small chest hidden under the floorboards of her room.

In one corner of the forge, Gilon had already begun to collect the old iron that he would forge into a new, wood-burning stove for her. He had promised to have it finished before the first frost of autumn.

Up in the mountains, Fili was working hard from morning to evening until even the heartiest of the coal miners complained that he kept them always on their toes. You never knew when Master Fili would appear, they said. He was forever looking over their shoulders, instructing them on how to lay hold of the shovel or how better to break the stone under their picks. Fili knew every ounce of ore that came out of the tunnels, and he did not hesitate to dirty his hands shoveling coal into the forge, but he spent most of his time glancing anxiously toward the south tunnel and speaking with Gani regarding the work that was being done there.

No sign of silver had been found down there, but the weak walls had twice collapsed in spite of all that had been done to brace them up. Luckily, there had been no dwarves beneath the stones when they fell, but Fili knew that they could not count on luck for long.

At first, Kili tried to keep an eye on his brother, but with Fror on him day and night, he could not do it. It was impossible to keep up with Fili anyway. He was too busy. In the evenings, he collapsed into a sleep so deep that Kili might have searched the place under his bed while he was still in it and he would not have woken up. Of course, he did not do it. He waited until he knew his brother would be out of the room, but when he looked, the pendant was gone.

Perhaps all would be well, anyway, Kili mused, as he lay in bed and listened to his brother's heavy snores. Fili was not so sick or so pale as he had been, and Betta seemed strong and happy in her own way, though he could not ignore the loneliness that was growing behind her eyes. He hoped that his visit today had given her some comfort, however little comfort she could take from anyone who was not Fili. His brother would not speak of her.

Thorin was convinced that the tall folk-woman was forgotten, and maybe she was. He seemed to be almost content, too, with the few dwarves who had answered his call. Only ten cousins had come, some nearer kin than others, but they were loyal and willing. Thorin left his library and meet with them all, being cheerful and catching up on old family news. There were other dwarves in the mountain who could be counted on, too: Frei had made it well-known that she wished to be counted, and Gimli spoke up twice more than his father could hush him.

Yes, all would be well. Kili closed his eyes and pulled his pillow up over his head. He was determined to be content, too. With so few of the dwarves that he had wanted willing to make the journey to Erebor, Thorin would have no choice but to bring his two nephews with him.

.

Almost two weeks after his return, and Fili was down in the mines again, but where else would he be? He could not be with his brother; Kili was under double guard with old Fror in the kitchen today - and hadn't he heard an earful of what Kili thought about that! He could not be with Betta, though his heart was with her wherever else his body might be. He could not leave the mountain, so it was down to the mines again, to stand and stare at the southern tunnel and wonder whether he might not be able to take a few timbers more from the common stock without his uncle knowing.

Fili smiled to himself. Of course Thorin would know, the question was, would he complain?

He shook his head and wrote out an order on the page of his book. He tore off the note and handed it to the dwarf who stood at his elbow. It was done. Fifteen timbers from the stock, five more bracings for the southern tunnel, and by Durin's Beard, let Thorin complain until he is blue in the face. That tunnel is not safe!

Fili sighed and started back across the floor of the mine, heading for the lift that would carry him up to the forge where he had more scribbling to do. He had been up and down on the lifts three times already this morning, but there was always something more to do. He was tired and the ride was long, but after his dizzy-spell a week ago, he was reluctant to try the coal carts.

As he walked, he heard his name called out, not 'Master Fili', or 'Fili, sir' but simply, "Fili!"

He turned to look and, for the first time in more days than he could count, he smiled. "Ha! Hello, Gimli! What brings you down so deep today?"

Gimli jogged up to his side. "You do, cousin," he gasped and took hold of Fili's arm as he doubled over to catch his breath. "You are a hard dwarf to find, and those fools over there had me halfway down the north tunnel before they would admit that you were up here on the floor!"

Fili laughed. "They had fun with you, did they? Well, your nose is too clean to show down in the mines. But I am on my way to the forge. Which way do you go?"

"I go with you." Gimli followed him to the lift. "I especially wished to speak with you," he added more quietly.

"And what did you especially wish to speak about?"

They stood back as a dozen miners stepped off from the lift. The foreman of the group bowed to Fili, who checked his name in his book.

"You are a bit late in coming, today, Thain," he said.

The foreman scowled. "Darned gears needed shifting," he said, hooking his thumb up toward the ledge. "One of these days, that whole rig will break, and who'll be called in to fix it? Not me!" He shook his head and bowed once more to Fili. Thain glanced at Gimli and did not recognize him, but he was with Thorin's nephew and that earned him a nod. Thain set off with his gang toward the tunnels.

Fili and Gimli stepped onto the lift. They were the only two on their way up. The long ropes creaked and groaned, but slowly they began to rise. Gimli put his hand on the railing to steady himself. He was not used to being moved by machine. Fili smiled and briefly envied Gimli his easy life as the son of a merchant dwarf, but only briefly.

"Especially," Gimli said gravely and in a low voice once they were high enough not to be heard, "I wished to speak with you about Erebor."

Fili glanced at him in surprise. Thorin's ideas for a quest were not as secret as they had been when he and his brother had first set out for the north. The whole of Ered Luin was whispering about it behind their hands, and even Thorin himself had begun to speak the name of the Lonely Mountain aloud again. But nothing had been said for certain. No formal announcement had been made regarding their plans or when the expected day would arrive, but you could not silence the sounds of preparation that were being made up and down the halls of the Dwarfhome. The mines had been roused, money was being counted, and many rooms that had long lain empty were being opened up and aired out as if for an army of expected guests… even if Thorin no longer quite expected so many.

"You see," Gimli went on when Fili did not stop him, "although I think that Thorin has heard me say that I would be willing to go and to help how I may, I am not sure that your uncle takes my offer seriously. I would go. I _want_ to go!"

"And does your father take your offer seriously?" Fili asked.

Gimli's face turned a bit pale. "He must, for he has ordered me never to speak of it again. He says that I am too young and will not take one step toward that mountain while Smaug lives in it. He says that if I mean to pitch so much as a single stone toward any dragon, then I must strengthen my arm to do it from here."

Gimli sighed, but Fili was smiling. He could almost hear Gloin saying just those words to his son. "And so, you would like me to speak to Thorin on your behalf and convince him to go against your father in this?" he said.

"Would you?" Gimli asked hopefully.

He shook his head. "As much as I would wish to have all us cousins riding into battle together, it is not my place nor is it Thorin's to tell Gloin how to order his son. But you should know that even _I_ do not have a certain place in my uncle's future company. He has yet to say whether Kili or I will go with him."

"He has not?" Gimli looked at him in surprise. "But I thought that it _was_ decided. My father speaks as if it is. He cannot imagine that Thorin would go to Erebor and not take his nephews with him to win honor at his side. Of course he will take you, Fili. He must! Unless…" He looked suddenly uncertain and turned his face away.

"Unless, what?" Fili pressed him. The ride was slow going, and they had a few minutes longer to speak before they would be back among the others. He was curious to know how much Gimli had heard, and what Gloin had said.

"Do not be angry," Gimli said, earnestly, "for it was not he who told them. I would swear to it. He has not said a word about the north or how he found you there, but I did hear my mother whisper to my sister, Nar, that one of you must have taken some deep wound during your adventures. It weakens you, and that is why you might not go to Erebor. I did not hear them say which of you they thought it was, but it cannot be Kili. I have seen him in the training hall, and he is the same as he was before, but you… well, you are not."

Fili frowned. No, he was not the same, but he had not thought how it would look to others. Kili often spoke of his brother's pale face and thinning frame, of the circles under his eyes. Was that the rumor, then, that he had been wounded in the north and was now too ill to do his duty as Thorin's heir? It was near enough to the truth, and it would well explain Thorin's mood to those who did not know why else their lord would be so angry and sullen in turns when he spoke of his eldest nephew. Indeed, Thorin may well prefer that Fili be ill, for an illness could be cured.

"No," he said to Gimli, shaking his head. "I am neither wounded nor ill. I am only tired from all this work, and I am as much in the dark as yourself as to who will make up the company that Thorin takes to Erebor. It has not been decided." The lift reached the top of the ledge, and they stepped off.

"I will speak to Thorin for you, if you like," Fili said, "but it will make no difference if Gloin has given his word. He'll have promised it to your mother."

Gimli's shoulders sank, and he nodded. "Yes, I suppose that he has. But thank you if you try. Good luck, cousin, and I hope that you are lucky in your suite, too."

He turned to go, but hesitated. "Kili is still sneaking down to town, you know," he said. "It is strange, for he does not invite me to go with him. He always used to, even when he knew that my mother would say no. And then, this morning, he said that he was there yesterday in the pub, but I had been there myself in the same hour that he named and I did not see him there."

"Yesterday?" Fili said. Kili had said nothing to him about visiting Betta yesterday, but he could not say that to Gimli. "I suppose that he went up the hill to look at a horse, or off to the quarry to break in a new axe… I have given up keeping track of him."

Gimli laughed. "Well, I am glad that I have only my sister. Mother would pull out her beard if she had to look after another one of me. Goodbye." He waived his hand in farewell, and then set off toward the tunnel that led up to the living quarters of the Dwarfhome.

Fili watched him go. "Yesterday," he said, tugging at his beard. Undoubtedly, Kili _had_ gone to Nan's farm when he said that he was at the pub; but there was nothing in that, was there? He knew that Kili went to give Betta her money… But why had he not said anything last night when he returned? How long had he sat with her and what did they say? Fili found himself wishing for news, but he knew that he had only himself to blame. He had made it clear to his brother that he did not wish to speak of her.

Tonight, he would ask, he decided. He would ask and insist that Kili tell him all, every word that Betta had spoken, every one of her looks that Kili had seen and Fili had not. Two weeks was two weeks too long, and he found that he had trouble calling up her face to his mind's eye. He had worked on her pendant every night and could draw that design without trying, but he could not remember the sound of her voice.

Too long.

.

That night, for once, there was only a small group gathered for dinner in the Great Hall. Fili's work usually kept him too late to eat with his cousins, but Kili had taken to delay his own sitting-down so that he might eat with his brother – although, Fili suspected that Kili was never so hungry as he liked to pretend, and that his fasting was done more in spirit than practice. Tonight, it seemed that a few others of Thorin's household had been kept late at work, for several of them all sat down together with Fili. When Thorin joined the table he realized that it was not a coincidence.

Balin had saved a place for his cousin beside himself at the head of the long table. On Balin's left hand were Dwalin and Gloin, and at Thorin's right sat Kili and then Fili. Before their long adventure, Fili would have been seated beside his uncle, but now he was glad to have his brother between them to give him time to escape if Thorin grew angry.

Even if the table had not been as long as it was, no dwarf would have dared to sit at the foot of it and risk being made the first subject of Thorin's long, thoughtful stares. Gloin's presence was more of a surprise to Fili than Thorin's – the travelling trader usually ate with his own family – but Balin seemed always to be where Thorin was these days and Dwalin followed his brother just as Kili tried to follow his. Looking around the table, Fili felt his heart sink. He was not prepared for the weighty conversation that seemed about to take place.

But Fili was not the only dwarf with eyes sharp enough to spy out the meaning of this gathering. Gloin, too, was looking around with a keen glance. The food and drink were laid out upon the table and left for them to serve themselves. The outer doors were closed and the alcoves empty; not a single servant or ceremonial guard stood by to hear them speak.

Smiling, satisfied, Gloin helped himself to one of the thick steaks that were piled on a plate before him. "It is good to see you finally away from your dusty scrolls, cousin," he said. "I am surprised that you did not bring a map or two with you to display for us."

"But I brought them all, cousin," Thorin replied, in remarkable good cheer. He tapped his finger against his forehead and smiled. "I have them all up here, drawn upon the finest vellum. Blindfolded, I could pick us out a path clear to… well, to the Iron Hills, perhaps." His smile was sharp, and he raised his mug to Dwalin who nodded but did not smile in return.

Fili looked at Dwalin, struggling to read the dwarf's inscrutable scowl. Had there been news from that quarter, then? He wondered. He knew that Thorin had sent messages to Dain, asking for armies and aid, but he had not heard that Dain had answered.

"You have heard from Dain?" Kili asked, guessing the same as Fili had, but only Fili knew enough to keep his mouth shut.

He would have kicked his brother under the table, but it was too late. Thorin's smile faded and he shook his head. "No… or, not a proper answer," he said, sitting back in his chair with a frown. "Not what I had hoped to hear." He was silent for some time, but all ears were open now, waiting anxiously to hear what improper answer Dain had sent.

Thorin sighed. "He asks for more information, news of what I mean to do and a tally of the strength that I have gathered from Ered Luin and from Dunland. All this, he desires, before he will commit to our cause, as if I could send all my plans for war riding into the wild lands where any passing orc might get hold of them!"

Balin glanced at Kili and then lowered his eyes to his plate. This was not a good topic to pursue, his look said, but Thorin had his teeth in it now and he was determined to chew.

"Do not trade looks around me, cousin," he said, turning his unhappy eyes upon Balin. "For what other reason are we all here tonight, if not to speak freely, unheard? Whispers echo loudly in these halls, and I know that my people are wondering what I mean to do. They suspect that this quest is some passing fancy or that I will go wandering witless and alone as my father once did."

"Thrain was not witless when he wandered," Balin said.

"Nor was he alone," Dwalin added more quietly.

"No, perhaps not," Thorin shook his head, "but he left without a proper plan, and that, I will not do."

"What is your plan, uncle?" Fili asked. His plate was empty and though his throat was dry, he did not touch his drink. He had no appetite. "You say that you hear the whispers in the halls. You must also know that down in the mines, the dwarves are talking. They worry, too, but they are willing to follow you… if only you told them where you mean to go."

The silence hung heavy in the hall as Fili and Thorin stared at each other across the table. Every dwarf in the room knew what had caused the breach between uncle and nephew, even if they had not spoken of it aloud. They had all been walking on splinters for two weeks, waiting for the dam to break.

Thorin turned from his nephew and looked at Balin instead. "That is what we are here to decide," he said, "what course we shall take. Dain's letter diminishes my hopes for raising an army this year. Without him, we have no thousands… nor even many hundreds, unless I take from these halls dwarves who would rather stay home." His frown deepened. "Tharkun has counseled me to move quickly, but also to think small. He has no stomach for war, and that makes me think that we had best take our own counsel and leave the wizards out of it."

"War without an army," Dwalin muttered, shaking his head, "is worse than an army without war."

"One can always find war…" Gloin replied. Balin frowned at him and said nothing.

"I wonder," Thorin said, holding his mug in his hand and looking down at the table thoughtfully. "I wonder, what have _you _to say, Fili?" All eyes looked up again, but Thorin's were on his nephew. "How would you propose that we take back our mountain home?"

Again, the silence. Fili felt his brother's eyes the heaviest on him, and he thought to himself, _our mountain home…_ But which one? Thorin's words were a challenge, a question of loyalty. Which home would Fili rather defend: Ered Luin where he had been raised and where Betta was, or Erebor that he had never seen? Would he take his uncle's side in this debate, or side with the wizard?

"I think that it is much easier to manage a small company of loyal dwarves than to lead an army of conscripted soldiers," he said carefully. "And an army makes for a large target should the dragon come forth to fight. You cannot hide an army."

"But you cannot kill a dragon with a small company of dwarves, however loyal they may be."

Balin stared at Thorin. "Then you mean to kill the beast?" he demanded.

"What else?"

Even Dwalin, who was usually up for any fight, shook his head at that. "It will cost many lives to face the dragon head-on…"

"… and a great deal of money," Gloin added. "Provisioning an army to march so far and still be strong at the end of it… that is expensive."

Fili could almost see the merchant dwarf tallying up prices in his head. Was it his imagination or did Gloin for once look less than pleased as he thought of gold coins passing through his hands. They all knew which of them would be footing the bill for this venture, if it came to that.

"Any additional expenses would be easily paid out once we have access to the treasuries of Erebor," Thorin said, as if gaining access to that treasure were as easy as opening his purse.

Fili stared at him. "You think to feed an army on credit?" he asked, indignantly. Not even Gloing would have suggested such a thing, and they all knew that the treasury of Ered Luin was strained. In calling up the old loyalties between the Blue Mountains and the Iron Hills, Thorin had hoped to convince Dain to supply his own dwarves, but without Dain there would be no supply and no dwarves either.

Thorin's look was dark and his hand was clenched upon the table. Kili sat tense and afraid, wondering whether he would be forced to throw himself between the two of them if they should come to blows.

They did not. Once again, Thorin was the first to look away. He sighed, and his eyes dropped to the empty plate that lay before Fili. His look softened. "Kili, pass your brother the tray!" he said suddenly. "Is it any wonder that he worries over how a soldier will eat when his own belly is empty and grumbling? No, no, take more than that, Fili! And bread, too! You are wasting away. How did you grow so thin?"

"He works too hard, that is how," Kili said before Fili could silence him.

Thorin nodded. "I have heard that you do nothing _but_ complain of _your_ workload, Kili," he said, "and yet you are not as thin as your brother." He laughed and took up his knife and fork again.

Relieved, the others set to their meal as well, and the tension was lessened between them. Kili eagerly passed as much food as he could his brother's way, but he was disappointed to see that Fili took very little. "Eat more, brother," he whispered when Thorin was too busy in talking to Balin to hear him. "Eat, or he will be at you again."

"You have taken more than enough for both of us, brother," Fili replied with a sharpness to his words that he did not recognize.

Kili heard it, too, and looked at him with a puzzled expression. Fili shook his head. Later, his look said, and his brother understood him.

The rest of the meal passed in relative quiet. No more was said of Erebor, and the talk turned to the production of the mines and the quality of the trade out in Dunland. Fili did not speak unless spoken to, and Thorin did not speak to him.

When the food was gone, the dwarves stacked their plates in the center of the table for the servants, then Balin, Dwalin and Gloin excused themselves to go back to their respective rooms. Kili slipped out the door after them, and Fili hurried to follow. He had much to say to his brother, but before he could go, Thorin called him back to the table and began to question him again, more intently this time, demanding to know his opinion on many issues of war and stealth.

"It is what Tharkun suggests," he said, bitterly, "but this going in secret goes against my good honor. And how secret can an army be on the march?"

"Not very," Fili agreed. "But how great a weight should honor be given in a battle against a dragon? The beast has no honor."

"So!" Thorin aimed a finger at him. "You take the wizard's side against me!"

"I take no sides," Fili said, holding up his hands. "It is you who have come against me as an enemy, challenging me at every turn. Your plans have been in the making for many months now, and I have had only a few days to prepare my response." He frowned. "Why are you against bringing a lesser force, uncle? It is more than a question of honor."

Thorin frowned and considered his thoughts for a long while. If it were not for the distance that was between them, Fili might have believed that the bitterness was gone, but he knew that Thorin had not forgotten the insult that his nephew had leveled against him.

"I mean to defeat the dragon," Thorin said finally. "I swore to my father, and he to my grandfather, that we would get back what was ours. That can only be done once Smaug is dead."

"Get it back? All at once?" Fili asked carefully.

"How else?"

"I think… If I may…" he hesitated, knowing first-hand how quickly his uncle's generosity could turn to anger.

"Yes, yes, speak!" Thorin said, waving him on. "I have raised you up to be a king. Let us see how well you learned the lesson."

Fili frowned and thought how best to approach his uncle on this. "We might… I believe you when you say that you have all the old maps in your head, uncle. You have stared at them long enough. But they are _old_ maps, indeed, and lands change. I saw this myself going north."

Thorin frowned at that, but Fili pressed on. "You agree that without Dain you cannot raise an army this year, but why not next year, or the year after that? You sent messengers to the Iron Hills as you did to all other corners of the world, but Dain is proud. Why not send a true envoy to flatter him? Or, send Dwalin. Dain will listen to him. There is room to gather an army in the Iron Hills that we do not have here and less distance to march. Smaug cannot look often that way or he would have wiped them out before now."

Thorin winced at the thought of another slaughter of dwarves, but he nodded. "That is true. You think that we still have a chance with Dain?"

"He asks for news. I say, let us give him some. Give him more than he can manage. A small company of dwarves might make their way east, scouting out the land and updating the old maps. Send them in one of Gloin's merchant wagons and no one will take any notice. Once you have determined how best to approach the mountain, then and only then go on to Dain and lay it out for him. He is a stubborn dwarf, as befits an heir of Durin, but he is not stupid. He cannot like having that beast for a neighbor."

Thorin looked at his nephew with new eyes. "Indeed, you _have_ learned your lesson, and a better one than I meant to teach. You have a good head on your shoulders, Fili. I only wish that you had stayed home and not gone off wandering in the north. We might be in a better place here now."

Fili met Thorin's gaze, but he kept his mouth shut. Now was not the time to ask which place or how better.

"Well, you have given me much to think on,"Thorin said, nodding, "but I know that Gloin is waiting for me out in the passage. Go to his family, indeed! He would rather count coins at me and tally the price he can get for his help in feeding an army. It would almost be worth the indignity of leading your small, rag-tag company just to see him scowl at the missed chance."

"He will have profit enough once the treasure of Erebor is regained," Fili said, knowing that talk of treasure always brightened his uncle's mood.

"So he will," Thorin agreed, putting his hand on Fili's shoulder. "So will we all! Now, off to bed with you, lad. No more work tonight, and tomorrow I will have Fror set some of your chores upon other shoulders. You are tired, Fili. Get some rest."

"Thank you, uncle," Fili said, nodding to him, and he turned to go.

Once he was outside the Great Hall, he allowed himself a grateful sigh. He was not wholly forgiven for his lapse into love, but all his hard work had not been for nothing. Thorin truly believed that Fili had forgotten Betta. He thought his nephew was saved.

He could not have been more wrong.

* * *

**Sorry. I've been reading Hilary Mantel this week, and now all I want to write is courtly drama and royal intrigue :D**

**You know the drill: REVIEW! That little box is looking mighty empty ;)**

**-Paint**


	11. Kili Breaks His Silence

**Middle-earth, and all who dwell within it, belongs to Tolkien. I am grateful to him for growing this beautiful garden in which my imagination can play. Please REVIEW!**

* * *

Kili stopped just outside the Great Hall and waited for his brother to follow, but as the door began to swing closed, he heard his uncle's voice call out, "Fili, you stay. I have more to say to you."

And then the heavy door slammed shut, cutting off Fili's reply. Kili winced. He wished that he had not left the hall so quickly, that he had stayed and stood by his brother's side. But if Thorin meant to have it out with him again, Fili would not want Kili there. This was between him and Thorin, and nothing good would be said if the conversation turned to Betta. Fili would not want his brother to hear the harsh words that would be spoken of her and of Fili himself in the heat of Thorin's anger.

Balin stood with Kili. He, too, had heard Thorin's words, and he smiled as best he could to reassure Kili, but there was nothing he could say. Dwalin shrugged his broad shoulders and then bid them all good night. He started up the nearest stairs, taking them two at a time in his rush to return to his own rooms where Frei was undoubtedly, impatiently waiting.

Balin frowned after his brother. "She will want to know all about it," he said quietly to Kili. "You know, she is angry that she was not invited tonight to our 'Council of War', as she called it. Ha! This was hardly a conversation, let alone a council, but she has already formed her opinion on the matter and is determined to have her voice heard."

"I am surprised that Dwalin does not calm her," Kili said.

Balin smiled. "You think that he could? I do not think that it has occured to him to try. He loves her for her stubborn pride."

Kili did not quite believe that anyone could love Frei, let alone his stern, grim-faced cousin, but she had her own sort of beauty. He knew, for instance, that even if Balin did not approve of his sister-in-law's outspoken ways, he, too, was fond of her pride and perseverance. More than once, Balin had said that if the Longbeards had had the steadiness of the Blacklocks, Moria would never have been lost.

Kili wondered if it was true. Frei was stubborn and strong-willed, but she did not seem steady to him; but then, she was only one Blacklock dwarf. What he had seen of Nan made him think that they may indeed be a folk fixed in their ways. He had been quietly asking questions within the Dwarfhome, struggling to understand Frei after his brief conversation with her in the lower passages; she had been warmly welcomed into Thorin's halls when she first arrived from the east and sought to marry his cousin, but she was not one of Durin's Folk and Thorin remembered it.

Kili frowned and looked back toward the closed doors of the Great Hall. "I suppose there is no point in waiting for them," he said. "Whatever they have to say to each other, it will not be quick, and I am tired."

"I, too," Balin said, nodding, "but there is no rest for me yet tonight. I must look to the kitchens for the feast tomorrow. It is lucky that we did not get all the dwarves that Thorin summoned. It is hard enough to keep Bombur and his cousin in food and wine. I pity the poor innkeepers who housed them on their journey." He bowed to Kili and walked away down the dimly lit passage. Like Fili, Balin was often needed in many places at once, and he had more than enough work to keep him busy all hours of the day and night.

Kili looked to Gloin, but the merchant-dwarf was feigning interest in a thread-bare tapestry that had been hanging opposite the Great Hall for almost an hundred years. _He_ was determined to wait for Thorin, however long it took, and he did not want to be drawn into any uncomfortable conversations with Fili's brother.

Leaving Gloin without a word, Kili set off down the passage as if he meant to go back to his rooms, but as soon as he felt sure that he was out of Gloin's sight, he turned left down the hall and made for the nearest descending stairs. Fror had gone to his own meal early in the evening thinking that Kili would be safely guarded in the Hall with his uncle; free of the grumpy old dwarf, Kili meant to make good use of his time.

.

From the Great Hall, it was a fair walk to the lower passages and the store room where Kili had hidden his sack of gold from the north, but he did not begrudge the journey. He had a great deal to occupy his mind and he was glad for the quiet, and to be away from Fror's prying eyes. Thinking was nearly all that he could do these days. Fili would not answer his questions, and he had no one else who knew the whole story of their time in the north and in whom he could confide.

Not that Kili had any great desire to spoil his brother's few quiet moments between work and sleep, but his doubts were not the sort to disappear over time; they grew and grew stronger. Tonight, Kili was more than just worried, he was almost afraid. He had seen the strange disquiet behind his brother's eyes the moment Fili walked into the Great Hall, and he had heard the bite behind his words when he spoke: he was angry.

He knew his brother better than any other dwarf, and he knew that, like Thorin, Fili's anger was a difficult thing to manage. Unlike their uncle, however, with no one to speak to, Fili would swallow down his feelings and let them chew at him from the inside until they burst out in a rage. Fili used to open his heart to his brother, but no longer.

What reason had Fili to be angry? Kili wondered. And to be angry with Kili himself, as he began to suspect his brother was. When they were younger, any stray word or stolen toy would have them fighting tooth and nail, and a quick laugh would just as quickly see them friends again, but they were not young now.

_"You have taken more than enough for both of us, brother."_ Kili heard Fili's words over again and wondered what they meant. He had had a full plate at the time, what more had he taken that Fili would want? He might have shrugged it off as a misplaced joke, but Fili himself seemed to hear the sharpness in his own words and to regret it. Kili had seen Fili's anger in his eyes, and he had read Fili's regret in the shake of his head. But what was wrong?

Could it have been Thorin's inquisition that prompted Fili's anger? Kili thought next. Certainly, their uncle had been hostile tonight, refusing to look his oldest nephew in the face. And who knew what they were saying to each other now? Fili had confessed that Thorin said he would take Kili to Erebor in order to get him away from his brother and Betta. Could he be jealous, then, that Kili had a chance that he did not? But they had never been jealous of each other before.

Kili laughed at himself for even thinking such a thing. No, if Fili was angry, it was due to some mistake in understanding. It would all be cleared up just as soon as Kili could return to their rooms with the last of their gold. The sack was nearly empty and in a few more days, Betta would have her payment in full. That would make Fili glad, knowing Kili had looked after her.

He reached the lower passages and felt along the cut ledge on the wall to be sure that he did not pass the right door. He had heard no noises and seen no sign of any other dwarf since leaving the upper levels where the Great Hall and living quarters lay; it was late and any wise dwarf would be well abed by now.

The sack of gold was where he had left it two days ago, and the small candle that he kept with it was there as well. He lit one and took up the other, opening it to look down at the lumps of dull, brassy stone. The treasure from the criminal Grahn's chest had long since been presented to Thorin – not that their uncle had been much impressed by a handful of coins and a few semi-precious stones – and now here was all that was left of the Lossoth gold that he had secreted out of the northern hills: a handful of golden pebbles and two large rocks, each about the size of a small loaf of bread.

"Fili will not be fitting either of these into his pocket," he muttered, hefting the largest stone in his hand. There were tools in their rooms that might split the stones smaller, but he hated to break up so fine a rock of pure gold.

Kili turned the stone over in his hand, letting the candlelight play over its uneven surface. He wondered what Betta's pendant looked like now; he had seen the plans for its design but did not know how close Fili was to finishing it. If he asked to see it, would his brother be angry or proud to show off his handiwork?

"Well, I shall try," he decided. It could do little harm to ask and might, in fact, break his brother's stubborn silence.

Kili put back the gold stone and tied up the sack. There was little enough in it that he meant to bring it all up tonight and make no more journeys down into the depths. He stood up and threw the sack over his shoulder, but before he could turn to go, he heard the soft sound of a boot scuffed against stone. It came from the doorway behind him and he realized that there was a light in the room that did not come from his small candle.

"Kili, my lad, what are you doing down here?"

The blood drained from his face to his feet in an instant and he felt his heart sink. He swore under his breath, knowing that he looked as guilty as a dwarfling with its hand in the sweets jar, but it was too late to hide the sack and any excuses that he made for what was inside would only make him appear twice as guilty. He would be dragged before Thorin with the gold held up as evidence against him, and he and his brother both would become traitors in their uncle's eyes. Betta, of course, would be blamed for their corruption…

"We did not steal it!" Kili cried, spinning around. He bit his tongue hard; better to keep Fili out of it altogether, but Balin only smiled at him and shook his head.

"Well, of course you did not steal whatever it is," he said. "You are not a thief, Kili, but what are you hiding down here, and why? Who is the other half of the 'we' that you speak of… though I think that I know the answer."

Kili looked around at the dusty store room, but his brother was not there to tell him what to say and what to keep quiet. Besides, he was tired of keeping quiet, and this was not Gloin or Fror but Balin, kindly old Balin, their friend.

"It is a long tale to tell," Kili said, sitting down heavily onto an overturned barrel. He had not lied before when he said that he was tired, and the night was not nearly over yet. He dropped the sack of gold on the floor between his feet and dropped his head to his knees.

Balin sat down on the barrel beside him. He put his hand gently on Kili's slumped shoulders. "Long as it is, lad, I have time to listen, and I think that you had better have it all out."

Kili looked up at him, at his blue eyes patiently waiting without judgment. At first, he hesitated, but once he began to speak, he could not stop. He told Balin everything, even what he and his brother had sworn to keep secret, even the things that had been hidden when they recited their adventures in the Great Hall with Betta beside them to vouch for their truth.

He hadn't lied then, but he hadn't told all. Down in the dark, dusty store room, it took over an hour. Balin listened silently and asked no questions; Kili found himself describing scenes that he had almost thought forgotten, the near miss with the orcs when Betta had failed her watch, how she had been lost in the snow and nearly frozen. Fili had left out many of Betta's mistakes in order to build up her reputation, but they had also not admitted to Thorin how many of the old Dwarf tales they had told her on the road. Balin knew those things now. He would also know, by the time Kili finished speaking, how he had watched Fili and Betta together and seen their growing fondness and affection.

"I know that I should have spoken up sooner," Kili said in despair. "I should have warned him, but how could I? Who would have guessed that Fili of all dwarves… and I truly believed that it was only a passing fancy, the fondness between warriors who have fought side-by-side. _I_ was more friendly with her at that time than he was! He told me that I should keep my distance, but it was he and she who would…" He shook his head.

After saying all that aloud, Kili found that there was little trouble in confessing the contents of the sack at his feet. He told Balin where the gold had come from, how he and his brother had secreted it into Ered Luin, and how they had begun to trade the raw gold for coins down in the forge and treasury. Kili swore that it was he himself who had done these things and that Fili had not carried out the deed, but he knew that Balin did not believe him. The old dwarf was not smiling now; his face was troubled and his brow was creased with heavy thought.

Kili finished his tale at Nan's farm, admitting that only the day before he had gone down and walked through the fields with Betta, giving her the gold coins and hearing her news.

"She is as much in love with him as he is with her," Kili said, staring down at his empty hands because it was easier than looking into the eyes of the dwarf beside him. "If I thought she was not, I could not have done as much as I have for her… but Thorin keeps Fili locked up here in the mountains, and Betta thinks that he has forgotten her. She cannot see how my brother suffers." He shook his head sadly. "Fili swore to marry her. She wanted Thorin's blessing and did not get it, and now she blames herself for her loss… What can I do, Balin? I have done all that I can!"

He fell silent. What more was there to say? Over many hours and many days, he had listened to Betta's joy and sorrow, and he had watched his brother grieve. There was only one solution to their troubles that Kili could see, but Thorin had blocked that way.

Balin said nothing for several long minutes. He was thinking hard on all that he heard, and Kili fidgeted anxiously with the cuff of his sleeve while he waited for an answer.

Finally, Balin sighed and shook his head. "Well, I suppose that it is no worse than I expected," he said, much to Kili's surprise.

"You are not angry with us? You believe what I say, that my brother is in love?"

"Why would I not believe it?" Balin asked.

"Thorin does not believe it. I have heard him say that Fili is mistaken and stubborn, that it is some fancy that he has cooked up to torment his uncle, or a fever he caught in the northern wastes."

Balin patted Kili's hand. "I may have no wife myself, lad, but I know what love looks like. I saw the sign of it in my brother's face many years before you were born. Those two were separated for much longer and by many more long leagues than your brother is from his…" He frowned.

"Yes, his… his what?" Kili agreed. "I call her my friend, but Fili seemingly calls her nothing these days. He thinks of her but will not speak, afraid that Thorin might hear. When Betta speaks to me, do you know what she says? She calls herself friend and wife when she is glad…"

"And when she is not?"

"When she is sad, she calls herself mistress and whore…"

Balin looked up sharply and raised an eyebrow. Kili felt his cheeks flush red, but the room was dark and he shook his head, no. "I do not think so," he said. "Fili would not be so foolish as to meet with her upon the road or during the dark days we spent in the north, there was no opportunity, but I suspect that if she were a dwarf-woman, he would have found a way by now." Kili laughed uncomfortably at the thought, and Balin nodded.

"Love makes dwarves do foolish things," he said. "If I told you all that my brother did when he was courting Frei, we would be down here for days." He laughed, and then he sighed. "But Frei _was_ a dwarf-woman, even if she was one of the Blacklock clan. Their families were not against them."

"Nan calls Betta her daughter now," Kili told him. "_She_ can have nothing against the match." He was glad that Betta had friends of her own to take care of her, but he was still bitterly angry at any world that would conspire to keep his brother from happiness.

Balin's eyes were on the sack at Kili's feet. "And you have been giving her gold," he mused. "Well, I am not against that. At least she has earned it. I thought to press Thorin on the matter, but he has so many cares of his own these days." He shook his head. "Still, I wish that something could be paid to her out of Thorin's own hand… for his honor, and the honor of our family…"

"Betta does not demand payment."

"That is wise of her. She would get nothing if she did."

Kili shrugged his shoulders. "What I bring to her, she takes as a gift, nothing more."

Balin raised an eyebrow at that, but he kept his thoughts to himself. He stood up slowly and took up his lamp. Kili watched him walk toward the door.

"Will you help us, Balin?" he asked. "I do not know how much longer my brother will wait, and there is not much more that I can do for him."

Balin stopped in the doorway and looked back. "Yes, I will help you, lad, but I do not know whether it will be the help you look for. You have given me much to think on tonight, but I want a warm fire and a strong ale before I start in on it."

"You won't tell Thorin what I've said," Kili begged. "Or about…" He touched the sack of gold with the toe of his boot.

Balin frowned and shook his head. "As I said before, your uncle has enough on his mind already. No, I will not tell him. Not tonight, in any case. I must think what to do with your brother."

"Go to bed, Kili," Balin said. "You are tired and need to sleep. We will speak again tomorrow, and I hope that daylight brings better counsel, to you and to me. And to your uncle."

Balin left the store room, taking his lantern with him, and Kili was left to sit alone in the dark with his thoughts. His small candle had long since drowned in its own wax. What would Fili say when he learned what his brother had done?

.

Two short hours after he left his uncle and brother alone to fight it out in the Great Hall, Kili finally returned to his own, safe rooms. He pushed open the door and was not surprised to find that Fili had got there before him. He was surprised, however, to find that he was still wide awake and pacing up and down between the small front room and the weapons closet behind. Fili's face was twisted with anxiety and, as soon as Kili entered the room, he rushed forward and took hold of his brother by the arm.

"There you are, Kili! Where have you been?" he demanded, and then he stepped back and looked at him more closely. "Run off to town again, have you?"

"Not at night!" Kili said, pushing off his brother's hand. "You sound like old Fror, always wanting to know where I've been. I went down to the store room one last time, if you must know, and here. This is yours, and the last that we have to worry about. I'm afraid that we must break up the larger pieces or they won't hide in your pockets."

Fili frowned and took the sack. He looked at it as if he did not know what it was, and then tossed it onto his bed. "You have been busy, Kili," he said, turning his eyes on his brother again.

"I have?"

"I hear that you have been into town nearly every day this week. It should have taken twice this long to trade all the gold we brought home, and longer than that to get it all to Betta, but you have been very eager. It was generous of you to make that long walk so many times… nearly every day…"

"Not every day," Kili said. He did not like his brother's dark looks and the sharpness was back in his voice. "I have been there perhaps one day in three since our return, and never for very long. There was not much gold there to start; at least, there was not much in coin that you gave back to me. That load seemed lighter than what I brought for you." He watched Fili carefully, expecting to see some sign of guilt for the pendant that he was hiding but there was none, only a cold, hard stare.

"Perhaps I was mistaken," Kili said. He sat down on the edge of his bed. "Well, what did Thorin say to you, then, after we had all gone?"

"Ha! And now you change the subject to Erebor!" Fili turned away from him. "I suppose you want to know whether Thorin means to keep his word and take you there, leaving me behind."

"He may break it or keep it, I do not care. I will not go without my brother!" Kili stood up again. "Why are you angry with me, Fili? What have I done wrong?" He reached for his arm, but Fili pulled away.

"What have you done? What _haven't_ you done while I have been trapped in here like a dog in its kennel? _You_ do not suffer under Thorin's wrath, walking as if your boots are lined with rusted nails. You may speak and act as you please, roaming the open hills with Betta, talking to her… taking her hand…" Fili's eyes drifted down. Kili's hand was still stretched out toward him, and he seemed to want to take, but instead he turned away.

"Do not listen to me, Kili. I am tired and not myself." He sank down onto his bed and put his head into his hands. His hair fell over his face, hiding his eyes.

"Is that your anger, then? You imagine that I am in love with my brother's wife?" Kili asked unhappily.

Fili looked up, and his eyes told the truth, but he shook his head. "No, of course you cannot be," he said. "But Betta… she is not a dwarf, don't you see? I have heard how her race talks of love. They are… inconstant, changeable. They love often or they act as if they are in love when they are not. You have seen it in town. I have seen it…" He hung his head again.

"And I have seen in Betta's eyes that she loves you and thinks of no one else," Kili said. He knelt down and pushed back his brother's shoulders until Fili had no choice but to look him in the eye. "She is only my friend, Fili. She loves you. She talks only of you… too much of you, if you want my opinion." He sighed and sat back on his heels. "Betta thinks that you have forgotten her. What gifts have you sent? What letters do you write?" Kili had given her gifts from him but Fili did not know of those.

"What should I write to her?" Fili asked. "What can I say? She is _not_ my wife, not by law… however much I might want it to be so. If I could see her, speak with her, perhaps I might find the words, but I am trapped within these walls, forced to watch my brother go where I cannot. Does Thorin know, I am in _prison_!?"

"I think that it was his intention," Kili said, standing up and brushing the dust from his knees. "But do not give up hope, brother. He has imprisoned you with an expert jail-breaker. I shall get you out, Fili, and steal you away back to Betta. I am working on a plan." In truth, he had no plan. Norin, captain of the guard, had trained his dwarves too well, and they were on the lookout for Fili's face. But then, Kili remembered Balin's sympathetic eyes and his offer of help; would he be willing to help Fili slip out of the mountain?

"It will be harder than you imagine, Kili," Fili said, standing up and beginning to pace the room again. "I cannot just slip away and stay vanished for hours. Thorin will ask questions. And if I should stoll back in through the front door, the way that you do… He will have me put into shackles! No, I must both leave and return in secret. I cannot be missed; they must think that I have always been here, but how?"

Kili watched his brother walking back and forth, but he was not thinking of escape plans now. He recalled the look in Balin's eye, the raise of his eyebrow and the unspoken question that had passed between them. Fili said that Betta was not his _lawful_ wife, what did he mean? How far had Fili gone, and what had happened on that dark night upon the road when he had crawled into Betta's lonely tent and stayed there until morning? They had both been fully dressed when Kili went to wake his brother the next day, but that meant little when the nights were cold. Their stories had matched, but was that because they were true or because they had been agreed upon beforehand? A dwarf might do many foolish things when love heated his blood and dulled his wits, but surely Betta would have told Kili the truth.

No, Kili shook his head at himself. Whatever the truth was, whatever she had done, Betta was neither mistress nor whore to him, and he would fight to the death any who said that she was. In his eyes, she _was_ Fili's future wife. What else could matter more than that?

Men had laws to govern such things, to say who was whose wife and when they had become so. There were property rights and rules that Kili knew little about, except that they seemed to govern the tall folk's women more than they did their men. Betta was beyond such laws, and the Dwarves had no need of them; a Dwarf loved once or not at all and they married only once. The laws that they had governed inheritance between cousins to the twenty-fifth degree (which was needed when more than a third of your race bore no children), but a dwarf's heart was given to one or to none. His bed did not enter into it.

Fili would know if there was some ancient Dwarf law that would apply here with Betta. He knew their laws almost as well as Balin himself, and Balin had been his teacher, but Kili did not dare to ask his brother's legal opinion in this matter. Better to let the whole thing go, and if he wanted to know what had gone on in that tent, he could always try Nan.

"What of Frei?" Fili asked suddenly, interrupting his brother's thoughts.

Kili looked up. "What of her?"

"Could she be made to help us? She was kind enough to lead Betta to Nan's cabin. Has Betta spoken of her to you? Could they be friends?"

"Betta and Frei, friends?" Kili echoed, struggling to understand the concept. The stern dwarf-warrior and one-handed Betta… Well, why not?

"Betta has said nothing against her," he answered honestly, "but she has said nothing for her, either. I do not know that I have heard her say anything at all about Frei. But what do you think she could do? She is busy with Dwalin and with trying to get herself onto Thorin's quest. She would not care about this." He did not say what else he thought, that Frei had little love for Thror's line.

Fili sat down again, but his look was thoughtful now. "She might be made to care," he said. "I saw her two days ago in the armory. She was giving orders for a new weapon, some mechanical device that I suppose the Blacklocks are used to. Dairn seemed to know little about it."

"She would want a new weapon if she means to go east," Kili said.

"Exactly that," Fili said, and he told Kili what Gimli had asked of him, that he put in a good word with Thorin even though Gloin would not allow his son on the quest.

"That is very like Gimli," Kili said, smiling at his cousin's young enthusiasm. "And very like Gloin. You did not agree to help him, of course."

"I said that I would pass on the message." Fili shrugged. "It will not help his cause, but it cannot hurt. What I think is that Frei would be eager to have her own suit put forth. Not that Thorin will have her, either; she is not one of Durin's Folk, but she might agree to a trade."

"Even so, what help can she offer us? She cannot get you out of the mountain any more than I can. Even the guards that are friendly with us would not cross Thorin on this. They won't let you out the door."

"There are more ways out of the mountain than doors," Fili said with a mischievous sparkle in his eye that he had learned from his brother. "Frei's eyrie," he said.

Kili stared at him with a blank expression, and Fili laughed. "What is this? Can my brother not know of Frei's falcon eyrie on the southern slope!? It is not spoke of, but still, it is no secret. How else do you think she sends word to her kin in the east? Why else do you think she is angry with Thorin? He uses her birds to send messages to the other Dwarf Houses but he will not take her with him on his quest!"

Kili struggled to understand this new information. He recalled that when Frei had first come west, she had brought with her several large birds of prey, falcons that she had tamed to her hand. The youngest dwarves had often traded stories of those birds, how they could speak to her and carried news and rumors to her ears or how they might peck out the eyes of her enemies. Kili himself had seen the drawing of a falcon inked onto the back of her arm. Those birds had a long life, but he had always assumed that hers were gone or aged beyond use.

"What were _you_ doing down in the armory, Fili, that you would see her there?"

Fili looked away sheepishly, but he admitted, "I brought down my knives to be sharpened. As many as I could lay hold of out of that mess that you have made in there." He gestured to the room where they stored their armor and private weapons. "If we are to go east, we must be well-armed and prepared. That land is wild, and too many times in the north, I wished for more swords than I had, for secret weapons that are not so easily taken from me by my enemies. I asked Dairn to forge new blades for me, too, small things that might be hidden." He hooked his fingers into the cuff of his sleeve and smiled.

Kili shook his head. "You will be a walking armory, and I refuse to be impressed until I see whether you can run, or even walk, under the weight you will be carrying!" He laughed, but his eyes were on his own weapons now. Fili had already begun planning their future quest; it was about time that Kili did, too.

"Do you think that Dairn might…" he hesitated and glanced at his brother.

"Kili, you know that you cannot throw a knife to save your life," Fili laughed at him.

"Not as well as you, but I could," he answered back. "What I need is a new bow. Mine was broken by the snow-troll, if you have forgotten. I only wondered… Betta's bow is fine enough, but it is a bit light in hand for me. It might be weighted and strengthened… it is still a good piece of wood…"

Fili's smile faded and his look was sad. "It was a good bow," he agreed. "Dairn will laugh at you if you ask him, but I think that it is a good idea, Kili. You will get no use out of it as it is, unless you mean to hunt rabbits."

"Betta killed orcs with it."

"You are not her."

Kili laughed. "Well, she gave it to me rather than burn it, yet it was her father's bow. Do you think that she will be angry if I have it taken apart and refitted?"

Fili lay down on his bed and turned his face to the wall. "You would know her thoughts better than I," he said.

"But you will know them, too, soon enough," Kili insisted. "Do not talk to Frei yet. Give me a chance, and if I have not gotten you out of here and into Betta's waiting arms before the week is out, then I will beg for Frei's help myself!"

"I would like to see it," Fili said. He turned onto his back and lay looking up at the ceiling. "You say that Betta talks of me. Tell me, what does she say?"

Kili sighed and rolled his eyes, but he told all that he could remember, at least all of the good. He kept her sad and angry words to himself. In his heart, he was glad to see Fili smiling again, even if he was once more being made the messenger between his brother and their guide.

Before they put out the lamp that night, Kili asked to see Betta's pendant. Fili was surprised that his brother knew of it, but he did not hesitate to take it out of his pocket and show it to him. He showed him how to work the secret clasp that snapped open the door of the locket hidden behind the filigree.

"It is empty," Kili said.

"Nothing gets past you, brother." Fili shook his head. "I have nothing yet to put inside."

"Why not a lock of your yellow hair that all the women say is so fine?" Kili suggested, grinning at him.

"I have not made it that way. A lock of hair would fall out."

"Then, you might ask Nar to fashion a miniature of your face instead; although, Gimli says that the image she made of him for his father's locket looks nothing like him. And I fear that she would keep a copy of you for herself."

"Gani's wife is a fair hand with a brush," Fili said, thoughtfully. "Shall I tell her that it is meant to be a gift for you, brother? But then, she might make my eyes too glaring."

"If she does, it would look very much like you," Kili said. "Go to sleep. You have work to do tomorrow."

"Not so! Thorin claims he will set many of my tasks upon other shoulders."

"Good." Kili lay down and pulled his blanket up to his chin. "Then we will have more time to find a way to slip you out of this mountain. I have only until the end of the week. Go to sleep and let me think."


	12. Betta Builds Her Family

**Middle-earth, and all who dwell within it, belongs to Tolkien. I am grateful to him for growing this beautiful garden in which my imagination can play. Please REVIEW!**

* * *

Betta stood at the top of the hill and looked down at the little town. She hated to feel her heart pounding in her chest, how it reminded her over and over again that she did not belong among her own people. How many days had it been since she had seen anyone but Nan and Gilon… and Kili, when he chose to visit. It had been three days since she last saw Kili.

Her eyes drifted westward toward the blue peaks of the mountains, but she refused to let them linger there. She looked down instead to the basket at her feet. Nan had ordered more cloth for the drapery – as if they did not have drapes already, thick enough to shut out the sun in full daylight hours! Gilon would have hidden the wooden walls behind slabs of cleaved stone if his wife asked him to do it, but drapes would do for now. And there was need for several yards of leather rope; the horse had broken its bridle somehow. The forge was too busy to spare Gilon from it, and Nan, like so many of her people, did not like the crowds in town.

Betta was glad to be made useful. And she was grateful to be free of Nan's instruction for a few hours. The dwarf-woman had made good on her promise to teach Betta all that was in her head, over one hundred years of knowledge and advice until Betta thought her head would burst from learning. But Nan rarely walked openly in daylight beyond her own farm. In town it was said among the womenfolk that the easiest births came at night. The men laughed and called it superstition, but what did they know was that unless the pregnancy was especially difficult, Nan would only come in to town under the cover of darkness, and if a woman's pains came early in the day, she must make do with a midwife from town whose herbs were weak and tasted bitter.

Through her studies and her own nature, Betta had begun to take after Nan, looking more sharply than she spoke and hiding away in the cabin when anyone came to see Gilon. She had had enough of strangers in her wandering, but knew that shutting herself away was no answer if she meant to live in this town and be happy. And yet, leaving the farm meant that she may not be home if Kili came to visit.

She sighed. "Sooner begun is sooner done," she muttered and hooked her basket over her right elbow. She checked for the knife at her back with her left hand, making sure that it was hidden under the shawl she had tied about her waist. She was no longer as quick or as sure with the blade, but its presence reassured her. Her left hand was growing strong, and soon it would be as useful to her as her right had been.

Betta started down the hill. The day was warm and the grass was green; she had money in her pocket. What more could she ask for? It seemed as if almost overnight the last of the snow had disappeared from the ground and the bright, new buds of spring had put up their heads on the bare branches of the trees. Birds sang as they built their nests, and Betta marveled at the sound. It seemed strange and unfamiliar, like the echo of another life. Though the mountains stood between her and the sea, she imagined that she could smell the salt of it in the air and hear the voices of the white seabirds. If she closed her eyes, she might have imagined herself back in Lebennin.

Her path wound down from the crest of the hill, passing this way and that, until it cut across the narrow track of a wagon trail. Betta turned to follow the trail, stepping between the wheel ruts as they curved toward the main road that she had taken with Fili and Kili on their return to the mountain. She knew that she was taking the long way round, delaying her arrival in town, but she also knew from Nan's description that this way would take her past the little hut that the dwarves of Ered Luin kept on the west side of town stocked with small tools, wooden bins full of coal, and many works of iron that they fashioned in the mountain. Few Men had ever been allowed within the Great Gates at the top of the westward road, and none were let in now while Thorin was making plans for an eastern journey.

Hearing all that Nan had said about the dwarves' business, Betta could understand why Gilon was worried and undercut the price for his own work. He could not have a shop in town, who would run it? Not Nan. And if Gilon spent half his day carting his wares up and down the hill, there would be no one in the forge to fashion them. Any Man who had no particular dislike of dwarves would find it far easier to buy his hammer and nails at their shop rather than walk the long road to Gilon's forge. It was only those who hated the dwarves and a few of the old Men too stubborn in their ways who waited for market day to buy from Gilon, but for the rest, nearly all town business passed to the dwarves.

As she walked, Betta passed her eyes over the grassy hills on either side, smiling to see spring back in the air, but when she began to pass by small houses and their little, fenced-in lawns, her smile fell and she kept to the middle of the road. Fences! So many fences that she was surprised. In Lebennin, they kept the fences in back to prevent the animals from wandering. Here, nearly every front yard was fenced in with wood or a hedge. Many had chickens bobbing and pecking within them, to be sure, but most showed only a brown square of turned earth, a kitchen garden waiting to be planted.

Suddenly, as Betta was passing by an open gate, a small, red ball of waxed twine rolled out, bounced over a stone and landed at her feet. She bent down to pick it up and when she stood she was startled to find a pair of wide, brown eyes staring out at her. The eyes belonged to a small girl-child, not six years old but boasting a long mane of unruly, brown hair.

Betta smiled and walked up to the gate. "This is yours, I think," she said, holding out the ball. "Be careful where you lose it."

The child looked back over her shoulder toward a woman, probably her mother, who was hanging clothes on a line not far away. Seeing that she was not being watched, the child darted forward and snatched the ball from Betta's hand, then leaped back again to the safety of her yard.

Betta laughed, and the woman at the clothesline looked up. The little girl held the ball tight in both her hands, but she did not look at it. "Where is _your_ hand?" she asked.

Betta felt her cheeks flush red. She had not noticed that when she handed over the ball, her blunted right arm lay plain to see, thrust through the handle of her basket. She smiled, but her face felt tight and aching. The child's mother had heard her daughter's question and hurried forward to pull the little girl away. "I am sorry, miss," she said, her eyes on the child. "Nia, you know better that to speak that way!"

Betta swallowed the knot in her throat. "No, it is alright, ma'am. She is curious, as I would have been at her age."

She knelt down to look the little girl in the eye. "You know where my right hand is?" she asked. The child shook her head. "A great brown bear came and took it away with him!" Nia's eyes grew impossibly wider, as wide as saucers, and Betta struggled not to laugh and give her lie away. "I did not listen to my own mother," she told her. "I went out into the wild woods when I should have been at home, and a great, brown bear came out of the trees to eat me!"

"Why did he not eat you?" Nia asked, astonished.

"Because I offered him my hand instead and promised to never, never disobey my mother again. And I never did. You'll listen to your mother now, won't you?" she asked. "Because I do not want to see that you've lost your hand, too."

"Yes, yes!" Nia cried, wrapping her arms around her mother's waist. "But there are no brown bears here."

Betta laughed and stood up, ready to apologize to the child's mother if she were angry, but she was not. The mother was laughing, too, and she combed back her daughter's wild hair. "Brown bears, black bears, make it a wolf if you like, but this will teach you to ask foolish questions of strangers, won't it? Be off with you. Go and play."

"And good morning to you," the woman said to Betta, nodding to her, but her eyes lingered over Betta's right arm and there was pity in her smile as she turned away.

Betta was glad that the woman did not stay to talk. She looked after the child for a moment and then sighed and continued on her way. Her spirits were lifted, but not very high. The woman had been polite and not cruel, but she was not friendly either. At least, Betta had seen no sign that rumor of her had gone down before her into town. It was possible that her history with the dwarves was known only in the mountains.

The little houses and little yards grew thicker as she drew nearer to town. Nearly all the faces that looked her way greeted her politely as she passed, but the townsfolk kept their distance and many eyes dropped from her face to her arm. The women in their yards were quicker to smile at her than the men at their work, and Betta did her best to appear pleasant to them and to hide her discomfort. The tall folk-women were Nan's business, and they would soon be Betta's business, too, when she began to help with the midwifery. She put on a smile and switched her basket to her left arm, keeping her right close at her side.

She missed Kili. He had never made her feel as if she were deformed. He asked how she healed and marveled at what she could already do with only one hand; but his words made her feel strong, as if she were doing what other women could not, and not lacking what other women had. She missed him, and what was more, she missed the likeness that he brought with him, the shape of his eyes and the sound of his laughter that was so much like Fili's that she could almost forget – and more than once she almost had – that he was not his brother.

Would he visit today? What if Kili came to the farm while she was in town? He did not like to be left alone with Nan or Gilon; they would not keep him if she were not there. Gilon was competition to the dwarves. The fact that he sold to those Men who hated their race did not endear him to them even if he was otherwise kind. And Nan was… but Betta was not quite clear on her relationship to her kind. She seemed certain that they would take her into the mountain after Gilon's death, but until that time, she was outcast and estranged. Kili was visibly uncomfortable in her presence, and Betta had seldom heard him speak more than two words to her willingly.

She should ask more questions, she knew. What was Nan's standing among dwarves? Someday Fili may well be forced to stand beside her and what then?

What if Fili came to the farm while she was gone?

Betta hurried her steps, but made sure to smile and greet every woman who greeted her. She ignored the growing number of men who frowned at her as she passed. If she was quick and had no delays, she might finish her errands and be back at the farm by midday. The whole afternoon would be free for her to visit with any princely dwarf who happened to stop by.

.

There was only one dwarf in the hut in town when Betta walked past. He had his back to her and his hood up, but she knew from his height that he was neither of the two that she hoped to see. Both Fili and Kili, like their uncle, were rather tall for dwarves. It was a mark of royal blood, Betta had always believed, and so had always known that her family had none. Her brothers used to joke that in Minas Tirith, you could tell a soldier's rank by how far back you had to crane your neck to look him in the eye. The Lords of Gondor were taller than common Men, and Elves towered so much taller than the Lords that it was a wonder they could breathe so high up in the air.

Of course, Betta had never seen an elf for herself; she could not vouch for their height, but she knew from the little that she had seen of the noblemen of Gondor, that they were men hard to look up to. She always had a pain in her neck afterwards.

There were very few tall Men in the town beneath Ered Luin, whatever the dwarves might like to call their neighbors. Betta kept her eyes ahead, searching out her destination: the tailor's shop a few streets down from the dwarves' shop. Nan had once again given her good direction, but she would have known the house from the shingle hung out over the door, a familiar outline of shears cutting cloth.

On his last trip to town, Gilon had ordered the cloth that Nan needed, and the thick, brown cotton was waiting for her, folded up and tied with a piece of soft twine. The woman behind the counter was dark haired and smooth-faced with only a hint of fine lines about the corners of her eyes and mouth to show her age. She made small talk about the fine weather as she took Betta's money and made her change. Her words were soft and polite, but Betta was beginning to see a pattern in the sort of welcome she would receive. The townsfolk were not unpleasant to her, but they were not friendly, either. If she meant to make this town her home, she must be accepted among them.

Recalling her stay at the inn two months ago, Betta knew that money opened many doors, and she needed new clothes anyway. It would only be a short delay that kept her from the farm.

"Is the tailor in?" she asked. The woman looked up from the receipt she was writing. Her look was cautious and curious at once. "I have been on a long journey," Betta explained, "and the wild lands are hard. I need new clothes, warm clothes, to replace what I have worn out."

The woman glanced at her, measuring the value of her second-hand dress by the thinning shoulders and too-short cuff of the sleeve. "My husband is upstairs," she said, "but we have ready-made cloth for skirts and thread if you need…"

"I have rather a specific need," Betta said, lifting up her right arm that until then she had kept hidden out of the woman's sight below the counter. The shop-woman's surprise turn to pity, but Betta ignored both and tried to put on her best business manner. "I have not the time for sewing," – nor the inclination, she thought to herself – "and my work is… particular. I do not suppose that you are familiar with the Rangers who roam east of the Shire, with what they wear?"

The woman shook her head.

"Well, if I have need to travel again, I will want trousers and a long shirt, both warm enough for sleeping nights outdoors, a leather jerkin, a coat for over-all, cloth for a new cloak and hood, but I will make them myself…" She watched the woman's eyes widen as the price tallied up. Kili's gift of gold was good for many things. "I do not suppose that you have any of those ready-made in a woman's size?" Betta asked.

"Oh, no, we do not," the woman said, "but my husband's skill with the measuring tape is rivaled by none in this town. You would have to go to Mithlond to find a man better. I will summon him down for you. It will be only a moment."

Betta watched the woman hurry up the stairs. She sighed, not missing the look that was cast her way. A vagabond wanderer of the wilds, a woman who has money yet wears poor clothes, who arrives long enough to purchase custom-made goods before disappearing as quickly as she came… if the town had not whispered about her before, it would now and she had better get used to it.

"They will think me a thief," Betta murmured softly to herself, smiling at the thought. Of all the things that she had done, theft was not one of them, but whatever they thought of her, this town was no different from any other. When she had raised her blunted arm, she had made sure to jingle the coins in her skirt pocket. That was what had convinced the tailor's wife, not any kindness of heart. Money bought goods and services, true, but it also bought goodwill and friends.

It was less than a moment before the tailor's wife came down again, followed by her husband still in his shirtsleeves. The man was thin and balding, his fingers knotted from holding the needle, but he was as good with his tape as his wife said he would be. Betta could not remember the last time that she had been measured. Nearly all her clothes after they left Lebennin had been hand-me-downs from generous families in Gondor and Rohan. She had resized them all with her own hands, added patches and mended tears until nearly all the original cloth had been replaced. Nan was right to insist that she throw out the lot, but she missed the comfort of her old clothes.

The tailor, called Brig by his wife, measured every inch of her and noted down his numbers on a little pad until he had reduced her life to a neat row of figures, bust and hip, wrist and ankle. Betta stood on a low stool, anxious and uncomfortable, and when it came time to raise her right arm for the tape, she hesitated drew back from his touch.

"Do not be ashamed, miss," Brig said gently. "I will not say that I've seen many women with your infirmity, but a country tailor is as familiar with the injuries of the world as any physician can be. We have had our share of unfortunate farmers here, missing limbs, fingers and toes. Wasn't it last autumn that the Wilson boy lost half his foot under an ox's hoof, Miranna? I helped to fix a padded sock for him so that he could stand and work."

"May I ask, how did you lose the hand, miss?" the tailor's wife asked.

"I never had one to lose," Betta told her. "This injury has been with me since birth."

Marianna bought the lie, but Brig was not convinced. As familiar as a physician, he had said, but he asked no more questions. He finished his measuring and took out his sample scraps of cloth, writing down Betta's directions for weave and color next to the neat row of figures. Every buckle, button and belt was accounted for. Brig knew without his wife to tell him that Betta was a wanderer in the wild. "It is in the calluses," he explained, and he did not need her to tell him to make his stitches strong and double-sew his seams. That, and the man's manner confirmed his skill, and Betta left the shop with no doubt as to the quality of the clothes she would receive.

Brig promised they would be ready in two weeks time, and gave her the receipt. She left a half-silver coin on the counter to confirm it and took Nan's curtain cloth in her basket. She asked Miranna for directions to the leathers shop, and then left to a cheerful duet of good mornings. Stepping out into the warm, mid-morning air, Betta thought of her new clothes, of wearing trousers again instead of Nan's heavy skirts, and she smiled, but when her eyes fell upon the mountain peaks, the sun seemed to dim and she felt cold again.

.

Brig Tailor kept up his salesman's smile until the woman was out of his shop and the door had closed behind her, then he allowed his face to fall back into its accustomed and reliable frown. His wife knew his thoughtful looks well enough after twenty years, and she laughed at him as she went into the kitchen to prepare their mid-day meal.

"Laugh as you like it, fair lady," Brig said, "but that woman will buy you the new cook pot that you've been wanting, and my new boots from Skinflint Mikel." He sat down at a little table near the back of the shop and looked over his numbers, drawing out the patterns in his head. He raised his voice to speak to his wife in the kitchen. "I wonder, where did the woman come from, did she say? She has money, and yet I have not heard of her. You think she'll go to Mikel for her boots? I should have suggested young Riche. He's not as sure with a needle, but he is a better man than Mikel…"

"She did not tell me where she came from," Miranna said, taking a battered pot off of its hook, "but the cloth she paid for was for Gilon Smith's farm. Curtains for his wife, he said, when he asked for it last week, and she had his receipt for the order."

"What Gilon? But she is not from around here. She speaks like one of those southern traders!"

"I have heard that his wife has family in the east near Bree. Perhaps she is part of them, Nan's niece come to visit?"

"I have not seen Gilon's wife for myself," Brig said. "I cannot judge the likeness, but from the talk I have heard, that woman is so… she is… Well, she is not so fine a woman as you are, my dear." He unrolled a bolt of muslin from the wall.

"Nan is a good woman in spite of her looks," Miranna said sharply.

"I did not say she was not," he protested. "But I cannot believe that this girl is part of her kin. No, it seems to me that she must be Gilon's daughter by another woman. Yes, I am sure that is it. And isn't it kind of him to take her in. His wife cannot be pleased."

"She would not turn away a woman in need." Like more than one woman in town, Miranna knew Nan's kindness better than she would ever admit to her husband. "Who is to say that Betta is related to either one of them?" she said.

"Well, I suppose that you are right, but we shall soon hear the truth of it from your friend Danai." He turned his attention back to the cloth under his hands, took up his pencil and began to mark out the lines for his pattern, for the shirt that would be Betta's.

.

Miranna's sharp look silenced her husband that day, but she could not stare down every gossip and busy-body in town who would speculate on the tragic history of Betta Smith. The rumor that Gilon had a love child newly arrived from some backwoods village up north or – what was deemed far worse – from Bree, was the kindest suspicion that would be passed back and forth from mouth to ear in the weeks after Betta's arrival. Among the less kind and more foolish Men, it was said that she had been stolen as an infant by the dwarves of the Ered Luin, that they had kept her and worked her until she grew too tall for their low tunnels, and then they had kicked her out.

Betta had sharp ears and, in time, she would come to hear all the tales that could be told about her. She did not hate them as she had hated the whispers that had followed her through other towns; indeed, she contributed to the conflicting accounts of herself, telling each time a different story regarding her lost hand. She denied nothing that was said about her past, contradicting only those who would insult her present honor, and as the weeks passed and she grew more confident in her position, she would become fierce with those who spoke against the dwarves until even the bravest man learned to hold his tongue when she walked by.

But today, as Betta walked back through town toward Hill Road, she was not fierce or at all interested in the whispers that followed along behind her all the way to the dwarves' storefront. Their wares were laid out, their cabinets opened, and their bins got ready for the day's trade. Betta was determined to see all that there was to see and, when next she had a moment free from Nan's instruction, she would turn her thoughts toward the competition. Even a mountain full of dwarves could not do all things well; there must be a place left for Gilon to make his living.

Two men stood in the dwarves' shop. She saw them as she approached. One was short with sandy-brown hair and the other was tall, dressed in black and had a cap upon his head. She could hear raised voices and knew that the tone were not the usual sound of commerce and trade. They were arguing.

It was not her business, Betta told herself, as she crossed to the other side of the street, but she slowed her steps and kept her eyes open. She would not refuse to be of service to either party, if one of them were wronged, but she guessed that the Men would need more help than the Dwarves if the argument came to blows. At least, they would need more help in a fight. After it… well, she had seen how quickly a crowd could turn against you. It no longer mattered who was right and who was wrong, but who had the most powerful friends near at hand.

Just as she had reached the shop, the wide doors were thrown open and the two men were expelled forcibly through them. Betta stopped and looked back. The tall man with the cap had stumbled and fallen to one knee in the dirt. The other kept his feet, but he made no move to help his companion. He backed out of the way as an angry, red-faced dwarf came after them. Hammer in hand, he ordered the men away, but the tall one stood up cursing and holding his jaw.

"You grasping, greedy rock-eaters!" he shouted at the shop. "Gouging a man twice his living for an ounce of rotten iron."

"The price is fair for the work, Dunlander," the dwarf answered him. "It is only your manners that costs you here."

Betta saw the shadows of two other dwarves through the shop windows. They could not avoid hearing the fight, but must not have deemed two unarmed men enough of a threat to draw them forth. Betta was watching, but she was no longer the only one. More than a few townsfolk had stopped to watch also, or stepped out of their doors. Overhead, several children looked out of their windows, eager for a spectacle at midday to draw them from their books and chores. One young girl shouted for a fight and was quickly silenced by her father.

"I will take my business to another forge," the tall man shouted at the dwarf. "See if you or any of your stunted kinfolk get another coin out of my company now or in the future."

Gilon would have laughed at the man for his petty threats, but the dwarf stepped forward with his hammer, ready to make the man answer for every insult given. It was only the sudden rise of voices from the crowd that caused him to hesitate. Someone must have spoken from inside the hut as well, because he looked back a said something over his shoulder. Betta looked around at the gathered men and women. It seemed that there were as many eager for the fight as there were against it, but when she looked back at the dwarf, his eyes were on her and even through the shadow of his thick beard and bushy eyebrows, she could see that he was surprised.

The sandy-haired man had kept well back from the conflict, blending himself into the crowd, but he was near enough to see the dwarf's look, and he followed it to her.

"Betta!" the man called, nearly doubling Betta's own surprise. "I have long looked for you!"

In an instant, the eyes of the crowd were on her, and those near to her drew away. She would have turned invisible if she had the power. The tall man with the cap looked at her, too, and now that she could see his face clearly, she recognized him as one of the wagon drivers from the caravan of men who had ridden with Gloin's company. He had had harsh words for her then, and she knew before he spoke that he would have harsh words for her now.

"You!" he shouted, aiming a finger at her. "I know you, woman! Still tupping with dwarves in the dead of night, or have you found better company?"

There was no hope for her to hide among the crowd. Reminding herself that she had once faced down a snow-troll, Betta lifted her chin and stepped forward. She did not have the delicate pride of a dwarf and smiled to show the man that his insults did not harm her. At least when he was insulting _her_ honor he was not edging the dwarves on to violence. They would find few friends here if they killed the man in broad daylight.

"If you know me, I do not know you," she said to him. "But I do know that there is only one other forge in this town, and by my oath you'll do no business there, either."

"That's for you to say, is it?" He laughed in her face. She marveled that he could be so brave when he was standing alone, but he did not seem to realize that the crowd was not with him. "I see that you have been busy," the man said, hooking his thumb over his shoulder toward the dwarves' shop. "One hand needs more than a little knob to fill it. Do you swear oaths on your _only_ hand, wench?"

"My word will be kept by my father, the blacksmith," she said. "If you want your work done, you had better get to him quickly, before I do; for once he has heard what you have said to me, he will break your head with a hammer twice as large as that which stands behind you now."

The man looked over his shoulder, and his confidence was shaken. The first dwarf still stood with his hammer in hand, but now both his companions were behind him, each with an iron weapon of their own, pick and axe.

"Be gone!" the dwarves shouted. "Back to Dunland with you and all your people, too! You might cheat honest folk in your own land but you'll not do it here."

The man sneered at them and turned back to Betta; for a moment, she thought he meant to strike he, and she wished that she had not switched her basket in her left hand. She could not draw her knife without first putting it down, and those were seconds that she could not afford to waste.

But the man did not strike. The crowd was watching and the dwarves stood behind him. His own companion had faded back again and would not help him. He scowled. "Let the dwarves keep you, then," he said, and spat on the ground at her feet. "You're ugly enough, they must find you pretty." He turned to go, calling over his shoulder, "With me, Tom!"

Betta looked up in surprise, for the first time realizing who it was that had called out to her. The sandy-haired man was Tom, indeed. The same Tom who had given her food, shelter and company on the road when Fili was too ashamed to do it himself.

Tom stood firm and crossed his arms. He had no intention of helping his companion out of the hole he had dug himself. "Not today, Daron," he said. "You would not take my advice when I told you to be quiet, and so, I go with you no longer."

The man cursed again, wishing Tom to the bottom of a wolf's gullet and the dwarves to the bottom of something more unpleasant. He cursed at Betta, too, but left without attempting violence upon any of them.

Once Daron was gone, the crowd that had gathered to watch the fight disappeared almost as quickly as it had appeared. Men went back into their shops, women to their work, and the children back to their play and chores, but each one of them had a pound of fresh gossip to grind at the rumor mill. Betta hated to think what they would say of her now. She crossed the street and turned her attention to Tom. The two silent dwarves had gone back into their shop, but the first still stood in the doorway, his hammer ready in his hand.

"There now, you have found her," he snapped at Tom. "Now be gone with you, too!"

"You might have answered me when I first asked," Tom said cheerfully, but he held up his hands and kept well back. "You need not stand guard. I mean her no harm."

Betta thought that the dwarf meant to drive them both off, but he turned to her and did not frown. He waited to see what she would say. She was surprised to be recognized by any dwarf who was not Fili or Kili and bowed low to him in the way that she had seen the brothers bow to those who they respected.

"Thank you, Master Dwarf," she said, "but I do know this man and he is safe with me. I have my own weapons at hand." She did now; she had changed her basket back to her right arm.

The dwarf nodded to her and put his hammer in his belt. He scowled at Tom but went into his shop without another word. The door slammed shut behind him, and Betta heard the loud thud of the bar being dropped. There would be no more trade done here this morning.

She stared at the door. Had the tale of their adventures travelled so far that even dwarves who had not seen her face knew what she had done for their kin? Or, _had_ this one seen her and heard what she had done. She could not remember all the dwarves she had passed in the dimly lit mountain halls, but there was no other reason for him to recognize her unless, somehow, word had gone through the mountain that a tall folk-woman had saved Thorin's nephews from death. As the tailor had said, there were not many one-handed women in the lands about Ered Luin.

Would Fili hear of this? Almost certainly he would, and she hated to think how it would cut him to learn what insults she had born for his sake.

"I should have known that Daron could not hold his tongue among dwarves," Tom said, shaking his head and interrupting Betta in her thoughts. "I should not have brought him, but he must buy his bolts somewhere."

She looked at him. It had been two weeks since they had parted near the river, but his face seemed only distantly familiar, like an old friend who had grown up. On the road, she had only ever seen him in evening and early morning hours. She had not had a chance before to notice the way his soft, grey eyes resembled the faded memory of her brothers. Tom was many years younger than Annandil would have been, had he lived, and the thought made Betta feel old and tired.

"I did not look to find you here, Tom. I would have thought you halfway to Dunland by now."

"We have been here two days. Our wagons were held up at the ford, but I knew that you meant to stop in this town and have been asking after you at every shop. No one had seen you, and I finally thought to ask the dwarves, though it should have come to me sooner. I know they were your special friends."

"And you should have known that they would tell you nothing, even if you had not brought along your ill-mannered friend."

"Not all our men think as Daron does. We have done good business with dwarves before, but your friends – of course you cannot be friends with them all – those dwarves who we journeyed with upon the northern road, they took more of his money than they did from anyone else. He thinks himself cheated. He was not, of course," Tom added, raising his voice and glancing anxiously at the dwarves' shop.

Betta smiled at his caution, but she motioned for them to walk along the road. "Whatever is the truth," she said, "he thinks himself wronged and it would be better if I do not meet him again."

"That is no worry. Tomorrow, the caravan goes east and back to Dunland. I suppose I cannot be with them. I had hoped to stay behind in any case, but I have had more luck in my search for you than in my search for work. I know that you bent the wild lands to your will, winning food and shelter from the trees, but I have always been a spoiled and lazy man. I would rather have hot meals prepared for me and a roof over my head."

"You want a generous wife, not a job," Betta told him. "The leafy boughs are roof enough for me, and a campfire heats food as well as any cook stove, but why do you not return to your family? Your father will miss you."

"My father put me on the wagon train. He wished me well and wished me gone, unless I were to return with money in my pocket. My parents have many mouths to feed, and they will not miss this one. But I must go back to them if I cannot find work or at least try another town. None of the farmers that I have spoken to would hire me, and I have no special skills to sell." He shook his head sadly.

Betta stopped walking and looked him over. His hair was too short, and his nose and chin were too long for his face; he was too old to have any hope of growing into them. He was a Dunlander, through and through, even if his eyes made her think of Gondor. It was no wonder that the local farmers were reluctant to hire him, and they would refuse outright once they knew that he had been with Daron insulting dwarves. Betta felt for him, knowing what it was to be in want of money. She thought of Gilon and his bad knee, how often he was forced to stop in his work to rest his aching back. The man was not getting any younger, and when the weather was very damp, he could not work at all, not even with the herbs and ointments that Nan cooked up. He could seldom stand for all the long hours that the most profitable projects required.

"What do you know of blacksmithing, Tom?" she asked him.

"Not much," he admitted, "but to be sure, I'll try anything once. Will you put in a good word with your father?"

She frowned but remembered what she had said before and added that to the list of rumors that swirled around her. "Gilon is not my father… or, he has not always been so, but he has need of an apprentice. The job will not pay well, but there would be food and bed in it for you."

"That is all that I need."

"Well, for now, here is something more. I shall hire you myself to carry my basket for me, and once we have reached the farm, I will introduce you. From there, you are on your own." She handed over the basket and looked down at Nan's cloth and the coil of leather rope that Gilon needed. She smiled. "If you are up to it, now that I have you, I would like to go back to the market. Nan will be glad to have honey and cheese in her cupboard, but I have been ordered not to carry the weight."

"I will carry however much you wish to put upon me," Tom said eagerly. "You have helped me out of a great deal of trouble!"

Not as much as all that," she said, laughing. "You gave me help upon the road. It is the least I can do."

She shook her head as she looked at him. He was almost a different young man. When they had travelled with the caravan, he had been anxious and hesitant, slipping away from his own companions to sit with her, but now that he was free of them, nothing could dampen his good mood. He did not object to walking behind her with her basket or waiting while she chose the best fruit from Harlond. He winked at the farmers' daughters minding their father's market stands and he bartered with the men. Everything that he did brought back to Betta the memory of her brothers as they had been before they joined Gondor's wars and lost their smiles. He was good company, and that startled her. She had grown used to the stern demeanor of dwarves; Tom's easy smile caught her off guard.

.

It was almost midday before Betta finished her shopping and was walking up Hill Road again. Tom walked beside her with her basket in his arms, heavy with spring berries, yellow cheese and cloth. He spoke more freely than he had when they had been in town and surrounded by strangers, and she found herself wishing that he would hold his tongue.

"I have thought of you every day since we parted," he said, looking around at the houses they passed. "I did not like to leave you alone among dwarves. I know that you say they are your friends, but where are they now? You do not live in the mountain, and they do not live on the green hillside."

"Some dwarves do," Betta said. How much would Fili want her to say? Kili would already be frowning at the little she had revealed. "I am not friends with _all_ dwarves," she told him, "but that does not mean that my friends are not my friends."

"Was that dwarf in the shop a friend?"

She shook her head. "I had not seen him before."

Tom frowned. "Well, your friends at least must visit you. Will they be at this farm where you live? Your father who is not your father is a blacksmith, but in Dunland nearly all the blacksmiths are dwarves."

"I know it," Betta said sharply. She had few good memories of that land.

Tom bit his lip and had no answer to that. They walked on, past the fence where little Nia had lost her ball. The girl and her mother were nowhere to be seen, but the clothes hung upon the line, flapping in the strong wind. They seemed to wave to her as she passed by.

"Gilon is a man," Betta said, softening her words. "He is a good man, and he will not work you hard. There may not be much money in it. As you say, the dwarves take most of the business. But Nan knows all the best women in the valley. She will point out as many quick-witted farm girls as you could want to make eyes at."

Tom laughed and winked at her. "And if it is some other farm girl that I want…?"

She shook her head. "Then you must be disappointed. This one is taken," she said. "Besides, I am far too old for you, and you are too tall for me."

Tom laughed and Betta smiled. She was still smiling when they reached the farm. She told him to wait in the yard while she went into the cabin to leave her basket. Nan was out in the field, and so they went to find Gilon first. He was hard at work in the forge, as usual, but had just sat down to rest his bad knee when they arrived and as such was in the best position to evaluate his need for an apprentice.

Gilon set Tom to work, ordering him to bring various tools and to wipe down the ash and fill a basin with water, among other daily chores chosen to test his skill. Tom did all that he was asked, cheerfully and willingly, as well as he could, while Betta sat with Gilon and told him how Tom had helped her upon the road. She also told him of her confrontation with the Dunland trader and all that had been said. The man had not been to visit Gilon's forge yet, but he swore that if he saw the tall Dunlander, he would turn him away with a blow to the head.

Betta laughed. It was not needed. She had told Daron off herself. She told Gilon also about the dwarf in the shop who had offered to defend her, and he nodded.

"They are a good people," he said, "in spite of the differences between us. Well, lad, you are eager, I will give you that." He called Tom over to where they were sitting. "You take corrections well and learn from your mistakes. I cannot offer you much coin for your work, but you will have a full belly and a full head to sleep on for every day that you work with me. You will have to make your bed in the barn for now. My wife will not have a strange man in her house, but the weather is warm, and if you decide to stay through to the winter, we will fix up the old shed with a few homey touches. Well, lad? What do you think of my offer?" Gilon offered his hand.

Tom laughed and he took it. "Thank you, sir," he said. "It is more than I had hoped to find."

"Well, that is good news, but of course all this talk depends upon my wife's blessing. Betta, I think it would be best if you brought her the news."

"I am glad for you, Tom," Betta said, and then she left them talking over iron and cloth, both of which Tom had helped to trade and Gilon had an interest in.

Nan had come in to the cabin from the garden, and Betta found her in the kitchen. She did not smile to hear that a tall folk-man had been hired to work the forge. It was only after Betta assured her that this was the same Tom who had helped her upon the road and vouched for his honor did Nan relent.

"I suppose that it will do Gilon some good to have a pair of younger legs to do the standing for him," she said. "And we could do worse than a man who has already been kind to you, but he must eat his meals and make his bed in the barn until _I_ am sure of him."

"He has already agreed to it," Betta said.

Nan sighed and began to unpack the things that Betta had brought from town. "Only two weeks, and already you are upending my farm, girl," she said, shaking her head. "This is not the usual way that a woman goes about building a family."

Betta shrugged her shoulders and turned away. "It is the only one that I have."

* * *

**A happy New Year to you all! Here's hoping that this one will be that much better than the last.**

**But there is one sure way that you can make my 2015 brighter... REVIEW! Maybe you've been holding off, not wanting to use up all your review points at once and now you've got a few left over that you're not sure what to do with. Drop one in the box! And know that it will make this poor, fanfic author smile :)**

**-Paint**


	13. Kili Confronts Betta

**Middle-earth, and all who dwell within it, belongs to Tolkien. I am grateful to him for growing this beautiful garden in which my imagination can play. Please REVIEW!**

* * *

Kili muttered to himself as he drove the coal wagon into town. Thorin had made good on his word to take some of Fili's chores from him, but he had given the task of delegation to Fror, and Fror had decided that because Kili enjoyed the town so much, it would be his job to make sure that the storefront was fully stocked each day. Today it was coal, tomorrow it would be tools, and he had a wagon to mind that could not drive up the narrow lanes over the hill. If he wanted to visit Betta today, he would have to take the long way around that would double the time it took to get to Nan's farm.

At least Kili had the consolation of seeing his brother finally able to sleep for more than a few hours at a time. Fili had refused to abandon his work in the mines, but the other chores he gave up willingly, and Fror was forced to take them on until he could find someone else. He had wanted more responsibility, but this was not what he had in mind, ordering wagon drivers and grocery carters on their respective roads.

Kili's delivery took only a little time out of his day. After the noon meal, he arrived in the cavern under the Dwarfhome where his wagon was packed and ready for him. He drove it up and out through the Gates, waving to the gatekeeper as he passed, then he turned onto the road and drove quickly down to the shop which lay almost at the edge of town.

If he hurried, he thought, he might even be able to get the wagon back up to the mountain and give old Fror the slip. He had no money for Betta – Fili had the last of their gold to trade today – but he was anxious to see her and speak with her. He had not been to visit her for three days and when they last parted, it had been on rather an awkward footing. That, coupled with Fili's growing jealousy and the conversation with Thorin last night regarding Erebor and whether the dragon might one day devour the Iron Hills, had Kili uneasy and seeing trouble at every turn. His only hope was that he might speak with Betta and be assured by her that all was well between them and that it would soon be well between her and his brother.

It would not be so easy, however. As if in collusion with his anxious thoughts, when he drove up to the dwarves' shop, the door was closed and barred and the shades pulled down tight over the windows. Muttering a curse, Kili checked the pony and swung down from his seat. He stepped up to the door and beat his fist hard against it. "Thran! Where are you, cousin? Open the door! I'm not driving this load back up that blasted hill!" he shouted.

There was a moment's pause and then the sound of the bar being raised and the bolt drawn back. The door opened a scant few inches and Thran's thick beard poked out, followed by his beady eyes. "Kili?" he said, squinting up at him. "What did you do that they have you driving coal wagons now?" He laughed and threw open the door.

"Does Fror need any excuse to keep me busy?" Kili said, shaking his head. He saw Thran looking up and down the street and there was a hammer in his belt. Dwarves had little reason to carry their weapons in town, and though many did it anyway, Thran was not one of those. "What happened here? Your door is closed when you should be doing swift business, and you go armed to your own front step?"

Thran shook his head. "Better to have a weapon you do not need than need one you do not have, but I am cautious. A sour-faced Dunlander was here this morning, saying that he was cheated. From his talk, I gather that he had been among Gloin's merchants not long ago upon the eastern road. We sent him on his way, but was it not Gloin who brought you and your brother home? Perhaps you know of this man already."

"A Dunlander?" Kili nodded. "We travelled with a caravan of Men for a time, and many were from that land. But they were friendly enough, as far as their kind goes."

"Well, this one was not friendly. After we threw him out, he began shouting in the street. His companion had better manners, but I thought it best to take no chances." Thran frowned and was silent for a time, looking at Kili thoughtfully, but a noise inside the shop drew his attention. He turned around. "Borin! Norin! Out with you, lads? We've a load to bring in!" he shouted. He propped open the door with a lump of stone and stepped out into the street. Two young dwarves hurried after him, spouting apologies. They scrambled up into the wagon and began to toss down the heavy sacks.

"Go to it, lads," Thran said, but he turned back to Kili and touched his arm. "If I might have a quiet word, Master Kili," he said.

Kili raised an eyebrow at being called 'Master' but he nodded and followed Thran into the shop. Fili and Thorin rarely went anywhere without their titles before them, but Kili was only ever Kili, even among the lesser and younger dwarves within the mountain. He liked it better that way.

Inside the shop was clean and well-kept, though the floor showed signs that the last batch of coal that had spilled had not been entirely cleaned up after. Kili's eyes swept over the walls; he counted the axes and hammers, picks and shovels, all the iron tools that were there and thought to himself that maybe he would not have to bring down another wagonload tomorrow. It was not yet the right time of year for farmers to be breaking their tools in the earth, and the shop would be well-stocked if they did no business today.

Thran stood close by, watching him intently but with one eye also on the open door. He asked in a low voice, "When you and your brother journeyed in the north, is it true that you travelled with a tall folk-woman?"

Kili forgot the tools and fixed his stare on the anxious dwarf before him. Thran was several inches shorter than he, and his bushy, black beard bore no ornament or braid. His family was not very well off being only distantly related to Durin's direct line. They earned a little from their shop-keeping but were generous with what they had.

"What do you know of that journey?" Kili asked, but his tone was harsher than he meant it to be and Thran flinched and bowed his head out of habit. Perhaps he _was_ becoming Master Kili, after all.

"I know no more than I have heard," Thran said quickly, "that you had trouble in the north and a one-handed woman of the tall folk gave you help. I was going to wait and tell your brother this, but you are here now, and Master Fili is… well, he has been so busy lately." Thran sighed and shook his head, and then he told Kili all that had happened that morning with Daron the Dunlander and the other young man who was with him. By Thran's description, the woman in question was certainly Betta, and Kili could hardly bite back his outrage as he heard repeated the insults that the Dunlander had thrown at her.

"I suppose that she was brave to take what he said without anger," Thran said, "of course, she had no weapon that I could see. I had already lost my temper and things would have gone badly for us if her appearance had not stayed my hand." He took a soot-stained cloth from his pocket and twisted it in his hands as he spoke. "I remembered what I had heard of your journey, and saw that the woman was missing her right hand, and so I stood by, ready to offer my service to her. If she had helped you or your brother, then service was owed, but she needed no help from me."

"She did not?"

"No, she showed the Dunlander off herself, and without a weapon! She said that the other man, a sandy-haired youth with no beard, was a friend of hers. It was not _he_ who had offered insults to her or to us, and so I let them go. They went toward the market, but an hour later, I looked out and saw them walking up Hill Road together."

"Yes, she is staying with…" Kili shook his head. "It does not matter. Her name is Betta. She is from Gondor, and she did indeed do my brother and I a great deal of service in the north. She saved my life more than once."

"Then I am glad to have done what little I did," Thran said with obvious relief.

"I am glad that you did it, also," Kili agreed. "I thank you for looking after her, and for telling me this, but please, do not tell Fili just yet. Keep this tale to yourself for as long as you can."

"That I will do willingly," Thran said. "There is little good that can come from bringing such talk into the mountain, but I cannot promise that my nephews will be silent. Young dwarves, you know, they act without thought. Excuse me. Those lads will have all the coal dumped out into the street if I do not keep an eye on them."

Thran hurried out of the shop and climbed up into the wagon. He ordered the two young dwarves down and told them to carry in the sacks that had already been unloaded. Kili went to the window and watched them work. Borin and Norin were Thran's nephews by his brother, Thorin – not _that_ Thorin, of course, but Oakenshield's third cousin once removed on his mother's side. Thran's nephews were not much younger than Gimli, but they were twice the fools and it took all their uncle's strength to hold them under control.

Kili frowned and considered this new bit of bad news. He had no doubt that the sandy-haired Man was Tom, Betta's friend from the road. If they had been walking up Hill Road together (which Kili found he could indeed see from this window) then there was only one place for them to be going.

He felt a knot in his throat and an ache in his chest. Dwarves were seldom jealous in love; once a dwarf couple swore themselves to each other, there could be no doubt in either heart, but Fili had fallen in love outside his own race. Could he ever be free from suspicion and fear? It was one thing to laugh at the thought that _Kili_ could steal his own brother's woman, but Fili had already shown his anger once when it came to Tom. What would he do when he learned that Betta was spending time with him again? That the man may be sleeping so near as to be within the same house as she! His jealousy would know no bounds.

And what of Betta? Kili knew better than anyone how fragile was her heart these days, how lonely she was. Hadn't he wiped away her tears with his own hand and held her when she cried for his brother? Those tears would have convinced Fili that she loved him, but how could he could be certain that her feelings would not change with time? Under the right circumstances, she might even have learned to love Kili himself, but it was impossible for him to love her that way knowing that she belonged to his brother.

Tom was different story. He was a Man and not bound by honor or loyalty. He had won Betta's friendship. Would he try for her heart? And how long until he earned her confidence, too, and she confessed to him the all doubts that before she had shared only with Kili?

He swore under his breath. If only Thorin had not been so hard-headed in his anger! If Fili had had some way to visit her, to speak with her and reassure her, there would be no room for doubt on either side. Instead, Kili had been forced into this tight place, to stand where his brother should stand and say what his brother should say. Betta loved Fili. Kili knew it to be true, but she felt the same fear that he did: that the longer they went without seeing each other, the more likely it was that one of them would forget. There was only so much that Kili could do to hold her steady. He was not his brother and could play Fili's part only so long.

He had wondered once, one evening late after he had returned from a visit to her, whether it must always be a bad thing to have a changeable heart. Many dwarves lived their long lives alone and unmarried because the object of their first love did not return their affection. He had thought at the time that it might come in handy to be able to turn your heart toward another, freer person, that it would be simpler. But it was not simple at all. Hearts could not be changed with the snap of a finger. There were hours, or years, in between when the old love was raw and painful to the touch.

Kili pressed a hand to his chest. He remembered the many lovers' quarrels between tall folk men and women (sometimes with several men and women each arguing over more than one of the others) that he and his brother had witnessed and laughed at in the pubs and on the streets of the town. No, love was not simple at all. His heart ached to think of Fili, working hard in the mountain, unaware of the danger that bore down upon him. He had a duty to protect his brother. Fili had to know the truth. And how better to find out the truth?

Kili burst from the shop. Thran was still unloading the sacks of coal, lowering them down to his nephews, and he looked up in surprise. Kili stepped up onto the fender to speak to him. "Thran, I have an errand to run. Will you look after the wagon? I will not be more than an hour."

"I will have one of my nephews drive it home for you," Thran offered.

"No!" Kili said. "I will do it myself." If the wagon returned without him, then Fror would be suspicious. "Hide it around back for me, will you? Pretend that the wheel needs a new bolt, if anyone asks."

"You mean if Fror sends someone looking for you," Thran said with a wink. "Alright, cousin, but hurry back. If Master Thorin himself sends a dwarf after you, I'll not lie to him."

"No more than an hour," Kili repeated. "I promise!"

He hurried away down the street, heading for a path he knew. Thran undoubtedly thought that he meant to sneak an ale or two at the pub and hide it from Fror. It would do no good to have the sharp-eyed Dwarf picking out Thorin's nephew running up Hill Road toward Nan's farm, but he had to see Betta and hear her dismiss his doubts or confirm them. It would be difficult to break the news to Fili, but better to tell him outright and save him the misery of seeing Betta face to face if it were true.

How miserable it would be for Kili remained to be seen. He might show his anger if she had betrayed them, but he would suffer less for it than Fili would. His heart was not on the line, only his pride. And at least he could be sure that if he did find Betta and Tom together, he would not have his brother's short temper to control.

.

Tom was working hard in the forge beside Gilon, feeding fuel into the fire and pumping the bellows to keep it hot. He had been apprenticed for less than a day, but the sweat was pouring down his face and neck, and he felt the effort in his arms and legs. He was determined to prove himself and did not complain, but he was ready to drop long before Gilon told him to rest.

"You are not used to the work," Gilon said, laughing as Tom collapsed onto a bale of prickly twine. "You'll get used to it, and your arms will never hurt as badly as they do today."

"I hope not," Tom gasped. "I hope that I…" He cut short his words. A Dwarf had appeared in the forge's wide doorway; his hair and beard were dark, but his eyes blazed with anger and he aimed an accusing finger at Tom.

"You! It _is_ you! What are you doing here!?" he demanded.

Tom stared at him in confusion, his mouth open and moving, but unable to form words.

"He is my apprentice, Master Kili," Gilon said calmly, leaning on his hammer. "I have only just hired him today, and he has not had time to do anything that would anger you." The dwarf turned on Gilon, enraged, but Gilon did not flinch. "Betta is in the house, I think. You might look for her there."

The dwarf scowled, but he left without a word, and Tom stared after him, not knowing what to think. He looked to Gilon for an explanation, but the man only shrugged.

"That will teach you not to come between a Dwarf and his woman," he said.

"But I have not come between anyone," Tom insisted. "I know that Betta is sworn to a dwarf. She told me so. Was he the one? Should we not go after them? He did not look safe to me." He marveled that Gilon would allow this dwarf to confront Betta alone. He did not act like any friend of hers.

Gilon laughed and shook his head. "I know that woman well enough by now," he said. "If anyone needs protecting, it will be Master Kili from her once she has heard whatever it is that he has to say. Back to your work, lad. Betta knows where to find us if she wants us." He paused for a moment, thoughtfully. "Best not to speak of any of this in town," he added. "In fact, I think that you will find much that is done here is best not spoken of."

"I'll not breathe a word," Tom said. "I want no part of it." He wiped the sweat from his brow and stepped up to the bellows again. He was new to this place and had to trust that if Gilon thought Betta was safe with the dwarf, then she was. He would keep well out it.

For the first time since he had met her in the Lossoth camp, Tom found himself glad that Betta was not free and he was more than a little relieved that he had not tried to catch her. If he had realized that Kili was _not_ in fact the dwarf who was in love with her but only that dwarf's brother, he would have been twice as grateful to have escaped.

.

Kili hurried across the farmyard. The winter thaw was over and the ground was hard under his feet. He reached the cabin and struck his fist upon the door as loudly as he had upon the door of the dwarves' shop in town. It was only after he had done this that he realized Betta might not be the only woman inside. What would Nan do to him if she found him beating down her door? He could not very well tell _her_ why he was angry.

It was Betta who opened the door, and he felt relief course through him, but though she smiled and greeted him as cheerfully as she always did, he could not help but search her face for any sign of the change in her heart.

"Kili?" She frowned when he did not answer her. "Kili, what is wrong? What has happened? Has Fili…?" She saw that he was troubled but did not know why and could not read the emotion in his eyes.

"That Man in the forge," he said, refusing to waste time on gentle words, "it is Tom from the caravan, your friend upon the road. Do not lie to me, Betta, for I have seen him!"

"Why would I would lie about that?" she asked, bewildered. "Of course it is Tom. You knew that their wagons were bound for this town."

"But how did _he_ come to be _here_, at this farm?" he demanded.

Betta stared at him and searched his face. Her soft expression hardened and she shook her head. "Ask your dwarven shopkeepers if you want to know that," she said. "I can see that no word of mine will be good enough for you."

She moved to close the door on him, but he stopped the door with his boot and caught hold of her hand. "Betta, wait! I am sorry," he said quickly, before she could protest. "I am sorry. It is not my place to be angry. I was only afraid for you, for Fili…"

"Afraid!" Her eyes widened and she glanced back over her shoulder. Kili saw Nan in the kitchen grinding her herbs and listening to every word that they said. "Will you walk with me, Kili?" Betta stepped out of the cabin and closed the door behind her.

"Gladly," he said, but she did not wait for his answer. She was already walking swiftly away from the cabin and barn. She set out across the open field. Kili was not much shorter than she was, but he had to hurry to keep up. Not until they were far out in the field, away from any listening ears did she stop and turn to face him. He thought that she would be angry now, but it was only sadness that he saw when he looked into her eyes.

"Make your accusations, Kili, and I will answer every one. Not because there is any guilt in me, but because you are my friend. If you had been any other Man or Dwarf, I would have sent you away and sworn never to speak to you again."

Kili took a deep breath. He was beginning to regret coming against her this way, but he must know the truth and it was too late to turn back. "You and Tom were very close upon the road," he said. "Fili saw it then, but I calmed his fears and told him there was nothing in it. Yet here is this same Man again. I have already spoken with the dwarves in town, and they saw you two together." He swallowed the knot in his throat and went on. "I do not accuse you for myself but for my brother. I cannot guarantee that he will not hear what has gone on. He has already been jealous of this Man, and I am loyal to my brother above all else…"

Slowly, ready at every moment for her to draw back from his touch, he reached out and took her hand again. "Above even you," he said gently. He felt her fingers begin to curl around his own, but then she frowned and took back her hand.

"Not for yourself?" she said sharply. "But who else has been to visit me? You tell me that Fili is held back in the mountain, that he cannot get away, and yet you return time and again to keep company with me. No one seeks to stop you! I begin to wonder whether it is _not_ for yourself that you visit here and deliberately forget Fili when you come."

Kili stared at her, but before he could speak, she shook her head and half turned away. "But no… I do not believe that no more than you believe that I could forget him. Tom is my friend, Kili, nothing more." She glanced at him with a curious look. "How old do you think Tom is?" she asked him. "But I forget, you cannot tell the ages of Men. He is more than ten years younger than I, and that is a lifetime to me. I am not who I was ten years ago, and I cannot love him the way you fear that I might. He is a child, and his eyes are drawn to women his own age… women far fairer than the bitter spinster I have become."

"You are fair enough," Kili told her.

"To a dwarf, I may be," she said sadly. "To one dwarf, I am."

Kili smiled, but she did not smiling back at him. He knew that he had wounded her deeply with his distrust, and he realized that his sharp words may have caused the one thing that he feared. How could she trust him again after this?

"I should have waited," he stammered. "I should have gone back to the mountains and thought over what I had heard. If I had stopped to think, I never would have doubted you, but that is Fili's best skill, not mine. Do not blame him for my mistake. He will visit you, Betta, and soon! I will have him here tonight if I must carry him down from the mountain myself."

She smiled at that and turned back to him. "I have always known the difference between you and your brother, Kili. I do not blame him for what you do, or you for what he has done. You need not fear to find another man in my bed." She laughed and offered him her hand. He took it and pressed her warm fingers against his cheek.

They started back across the field, walking slowly toward the road. "I suppose that you must warn your brother about Tom," she said as they approached the cabin. "Assure him that he is only a friend to me, a brother to replace the ones I have lost. That is his only place in my heart, and it is a far lesser a place than the one you hold, Kili."

"When my brother is here, you will have no more need of me," he said. They had reached the yard, and he stopped. He meant to take the winding path again and not Hill Road. "You should not have had to rely on me as much as you did."

"That is no one's fault," Betta said. "Or the fault is mine alone for not going back to the mountain and demanding to see Fili as I swore I would do if he did not return... But that is in the past, and I never regret things past if I can help it. I would have both of you with me again, often and for many hours together, as much as I can have, for I begin to fear we have little time left. The eastern wind blows cold."

"Fili might convince our uncle to delay," he told her. He did not like dark words of omen. "We may have a full year or more to prepare for the parting. And after our journey is over, I know that Thorin will relent. He will be satisfied once he has his mountain and his gold, then Fili and I will return to you. Your race may have a short lifespan, Betta, but there are still many years left for you to be happy."

"I would settle for a moment of not being sad." She looked at him wearily, and then looked away. "But that was a moment of weakness, and now I must be strong. I will not keep you here. Thank you, Kili, but go. Back up the hill before I change my mind, and if you do carry Fili back to me, bring him right up to the door and do not set him down until I have answered your knock. It is a sight that I would very much like to see."

Kili laughed, but he knew that she did not really believe that Fili would ever return to her.

"Farewell," he said. "He will be here, Betta. Farewell." He pressed her hand then he turned away. He gave the forge wide berth, cutting across the field and breaking into a jog once he reached the path. He still had the coal wagon to retrieve from Thran at the shop, and much work left to do in the mountain, but then he would go in search of Balin. If any dwarf had an answer to the trouble he was in, it would be Balin.

* * *

**Make of that what you will, lovely readers, and let me know what you think. Poor Kili! Poor Betta! Poor all my poor characters! They should have chosen a kinder author to write for them.**

**Now, what happens next?**

**-Paint**


	14. Balin Works Late

**Will you leave a review? Pretty please? Here's a whole Balin chapter just to butter you up :)**

* * *

Balin sat at his desk in his private rooms with a mess of ledgers and papers spread out before him. The stack of books on the floor reached up to his knees – or at least it had before it tipped for the third time. He had not bothered to upright the tower again. He had only a single candle lit at his elbow on the expectation that the failing light would hurry him to bed. It did not. As the taper sank, so did his shoulders until he was hunched up over his page hours after sunset, still counting coins and counting the days left before Gandalf's return.

"Four weeks…" he murmured to himself. "He said four weeks, and it has been eleven… no, today will make it twelve days." At some point today had become tomorrow. He shook his head and wiped the smoke from his eyes, blinking as he reached for a new candle, but he did not light it yet.

At least Thorin had calmed down a bit in recent days. They had Fili and Kili to thank for that, Balin knew. Even if their uncle was still unhappy with them, Thorin slept easier knowing that his nephews were nearby. If he had had a wife and child of his own, they might have been saved a great deal of worry, Balin thought, but he did not say that out loud.

And now there was this matter with Kili. Or, with his brother, really, who was the source of the trouble for once. Falling in love was dangerous business at the best of times.

Balin wracked his brain but he could not think of a single instance of a royal dwarf loving outside his race, not even among the second sons and extra daughters of the ruling kings and their kin. Maybe it had been done by one of the other Houses, but among Durin's descendants, only lesser dwarves were free and foolish enough to do such a thing – at least, to do it and leave record of it. It was not natural. Thorin had a right to be angry, but his anger would change nothing. What was done was done. And after hearing all that Kili had to say, Balin knew that it was done. He also knew that keeping the lovers apart – however much it might vent Thorin's spleen – could do untold damage to Fili's heath and mind.

But there was more than him to think of, wasn't there? Well, wasn't there?

Balin had helped to raise the lad since he was knee high. He had taught him law and protocols, taken him on his first trip down into the Ered Luin mines. He had not taught him the sword, that was Dwalin's work there, but he had taught him to write and to read the thick books in the Durin library. If Fili's figures were well ordered and always added up, he had Balin to thank for it. If only some of that steadiness had wandered from his head to his heart.

Balin sighed and his eyes drifted down to his desk. The ledgers needed looking after, but he had spent most of his day going over old accounts, determining how much ready money could be got together at short notice, and what travel supplies were waiting for them down below. He did not know what it was about Gandalf's manner that had troubled him. Four weeks, he had said, and then he would be back for more arguing. But he had come and gone so quickly from his last meeting with Thorin that Balin could not help but think on what it foretold. A wizard might lie in wait for an hundred years before he struck like a bolt of lightning out of the blue and threw everything into disarray.

And what could he want with the Haven elves? Balin wondered. How many irons did he have in the fire?

He yawned into his sleeve and shook his head. It was too late to find answers to any of the questions that troubled him. It was too late for straight thinking, and he would have slept but for his restless thoughts and something else… some uneasy sense of foreboding that kept him from his bed, an expectation of…

A sharp knock on the door made him jump, and he realized that he had begun to doze. He sighed and closed the book in front of him. The knock came again. "Yes, what is it?" he called, his voice heavy with sleep. "Come inside! The door is not bolted."

And it wasn't. He heard it open and the soft scuff of heavy boots on the floor. He heard the door close and then all was quiet. No voice greeted him, and the steps came no closer, but he would recognize that heartfelt sigh anywhere.

"Well, brother, what is it?" Balin asked, turning in his chair. It was a strange thing for Dwalin to hang back by the door when he would usually have marched in and sat down wherever he pleased. Balin peered through the darkness, but candlelight was too dim to make out his brother's features clearly.

"Should you not be with Frei?" he asked. "It is late and she will wonder where you have gone."

"She knows where I am," Dwalin assured him. He looked around and took up a low stool that sat near the door. He pulled it close to the desk and sat down heavily upon it. It was too low a seat for his long legs, but he folded himself onto it and sat with his elbows on his knees and his chin in his hands. His eyes were wide and amazed, and he looked for all the world to Balin as if he were a young dwarf lad who had been struck too hard over the head in the training hall.

"I'll light the lamp," Balin said, but Dwalin shook his head.

"No, leave it dark," he said, then lapsed into silence again.

Balin frowned. "Out with it, lad," he said. When they had been children growing up in the Iron Hills, he had used to prod his brother with an iron rod to get him admit what troubled him, but he had no rod handy. "Speak up. I cannot read your thoughts."

Dwalin looked up. "Frei is… she is… and I am…" he stammered and he stopped. He frowned and shook his head. He sat up straight and then slouched again, and Balin waited patiently until finally, his brother burst forth and declared, "We have made a child!"

Dwalin's eyes widened as if he did not quite believe what he himself had said, but Balin laughed out loud. "What, Frei is with child? Well, that is good news, brother! You have had it confirmed?" He leaned forward and grasped Dwalin's hands, but his brother shook his head.

"No, not confirmed, but she says that she knows it, in her body and in her heart. I believe her."

"Ah, of course," Balin nodded. "Well, she will know best, but we will call in Oin tomorrow, as soon as he is up, and he will confirm it…"

Dwalin shook his head. "She will not see him. She says that she will only allow her own kinswoman to confirm it."

"But who can she… What Nan?" Balin stared at him in amazement. There were dwarves in the mountain – the ignorant and the superstitious – who called Nan a witch because she still practiced the healing arts of the Orocarni, but most dwarves only mistrusted her because of her husband. She was shunned, and if anyone went to consult with her, they did so in secret and said nothing about it. But Frei was not one to be silent, and there would be grumbling within the mountain once word got out that the wife of Thorin's own cousin had gone outside the Dwarfhome for her care.

"I have no objection to her choice in midwife," Dwalin said. "If I were injured on the battlefield and had my choice, I would rather be treated by one of my own kin, and the cut of a sword blade is less personal to me than this matter is to women. Anyway, that woman knows her business even if she has made poor choices in her life." He nodded once and firmly, as if to put an end to all argument, but they both knew that even if Dwalin _had_ objected to Nan, it would mean nothing once Frei made up her mind.

Besides, Balin thought to himself, hadn't Fili made the same poor choice? Did he object to his cousin? Of course, Fili had not yet forsaken his own kind to live the woman he loved, but that choice lay before him and one day he would have to decide…

Dwalin was speaking rapidly now, and Balin struggled to catch up. "… in a day or two, under the cover of night," he was saying, "unless Nan will come up from her farm, but then we would have to disguise her. No, Frei will want to go down, and afterwards, we will know for certain. I do not doubt her word, only I am… surprised. It is unexpected. I would have said that the thing was impossible!"

"Unusual," Balin told him, "not impossible." But he knew what his brother meant. Dwalin was nearly sixty years past the age when most dwarves fashioned their first child, and Frei was not much younger. "You married late in life," he reminded him.

"It could not be done sooner."

Balin nodded. He well remembered those early days, the many years that passed between Azanulbizar and Frei's return to the west. Dwalin may have married later than most dwarves, but he was young when he fell in love. Very young.

How old had he been? Balin tried to count the years. Not even thirty! Balin himself had seen only thirty-six in this world when he fought that war, but his little brother had disguised himself and ridden with Dain among the warriors from the Iron Hills. Dwalin had disobeyed their father. He had joined the host at Azanulbizar and proven himself to be quite the formidable force. Was that lad the same dwarf who now sat here before him, hunched up on a short stool, looking lost and afraid of a frail infant not yet born?

"I am glad for you, brother," Balin said, "and I will be gladder still to hear the pitter-patter of little feet echoing about these halls once again." He smiled. "I am sure that Nan will be kind. She will take good care of them both."

Dwalin waved away his concern. "Yes, yes," he said, impatiently. "I am not worried about that. It is me! A father! How can it be so…?"

"I need not explain the mechanics of it to you." Balin laughed, but Dwalin did not hear him.

"… so close on the heels of Erebor," he cried. "How can I leave her at such a time? But Thorin is my _King_! And I have sworn to follow him."

So caught up in the thought of a new niece or nephew, Balin had forgotten all about the very journey that he had minutes ago been planning. He frowned and sank back into his chair. "I was not thinking… Of course, the quest. It is a very difficult time," he agreed. "Have you spoken with Frei?"

"She cannot very well change the time of the child's birth." Dwalin stood up and began pacing the room; his broad shoulders seemed to grow twice as wide as the looming shadows shrank behind him. "I have not mentioned Erebor to her," he said. "I do not need to. She is glad of the child, but she is angry, too. She had hoped to convince Thorin to take her with us to Erebor. She wanted the chance to bloody her blade as she did long ago, but this is the end of her hopes. She cannot go with us now, and indeed, I do not think that she would want to, but that does not stop her being angry at the lost chance."

"It is better for her this way," Balin said. "Thorin would never have agreed."

"Yes, her choice has been made for her, but what of _my_ choice, brother?" Dwalin demanded, turning to him and holding out his hands as if pleading for an answer. "Before I had a wife, and now this child, I had only my sword and my King. I have sworn to follow Thorin at all times and in whatsoever direction he chooses. How can I abandon him now when Erebor is so near!?"

Balin kept to himself what he thought about that. Erebor was no nearer today than it was yesterday or last year. The dragon still lived and the company was not even on the road. Who knew what would happen once they turned their faces eastward? Those roads were dangerous.

"Speak to Frei," he urged his brother. "Tell her your fears. I doubt that she would want you to give up the honor of this quest. She is a strong woman. Strong enough to send you on your way, and when you return, she will greet you with your new son or daughter in her arms."

Dwalin stopped pacing and looked down at his hands. "You mean _if_ I return, brother," he said quietly. "Against the dragon, there is no guarantee."

"Speak to Frei," Balin said again. "I cannot give you no better advice than to speak to your wife."

Dwalin frowned, and then he nodded; he knew his brother was right. He sat down on the stool, and they spoke for a little while longer, discussing infant names and which weapon the little dwarf would choose to wield first, but Dwalin did not stay long; he must get back to Frei. Soon enough, he bid Balin good night and left his brother's rooms. He walked slowly down the passageway, still weighing the names of his close kin in his mind. Name the child after his father? His mother? What were the names of Frei's people in the Red Mountains? Would she rather choose from those?

Lost in his thoughts, he nearly ran into Kili who was hurrying through the dark in the other direction. "Whoa, there, lad!" he called. "It is late! What are you doing up?"

"All the work that I should have done _before_ it was late," Kili answered, "but I have been busy. Have you been to see Balin? Is he yet awake? I must ask him… I had hoped that he might help me with a particular problem that I have."

"How particular can it be at this hour?" Dwalin laughed. Kili's expression was so unhappy that he considered sharing his good news to cheer the lad up, but he knew that Frei would want a formal announcement made only after Nan had confirmed her condition. "My brother is in his room, and he was awake two minutes ago when I left him." He saw Kili look quickly down the hall, wringing his hands together and bouncing impatiently on his heels. "If you would want the opinion of _two_ dwarves," Dwalin offered, "I would be glad to stay…"

"No!" Kili said, a little too quickly. "No, one is more than enough for me," he added. Dwalin frowned and Kili shrugged his shoulders. "It is… personal." And it was, if not to his own person. "But I thank you, cousin, and if I do find that I need a second opinion, I will know where to look for you." His smile was strained as he bowed to his cousin and hurried off down the hall toward Balin's rooms.

Dwalin looked after him for a long moment, shaking his head, but he had no inclination to chase down the lad. "If the cold of the north cannot steady him, then nothing will," he said to no one in particular, and then continued on his way, his thoughts turning easily back to his wife and their miraculous child.

.

Balin stacked his books and papers together, deciding quite happily that his brother's good news should close out the night. It was time to go to bed and dream of laughing nieces and nephews running up and down the stairs, pitter-pattering their little feet upon the stone.

He smiled to himself as he readied for bed, but before he had got even the first button undone, he heard another swift knock at the door. This one came louder and more urgent than his brother's had been. Indeed, so desperate did it sound to him that Balin did not call out. He crossed the room himself and pulled open the door, half expecting the passage to be on fire or in flood.

"Kili, lad? What is it? You look as if you have been running up hill!" He wore his expression of surprise uncomfortably, because he was not really surprised. This meeting had been expected – and avoided – all day.

"I _have_ been running uphill," Kili said with a sigh, "and what is more, I _feel_ as if I have, too. Balin, you said that we would speak today of what I told you last night. Do not say that the day is over, you have not gone to bed." He looked back over his shoulder, searching the empty passage for secret listeners, but Dwalin had left for his rooms and every other sane dwarf was asleep at this hour.

Balin sighed. It should no longer surprise him to find Kili wandering hallways late at night, but he had hoped for one more night to sleep on his thoughts before he was forced to choose a course. It seemed that luck was not with him on this; it had walked away with his brother.

"I suppose that I did say it," he agreed reluctantly and stepped back to let Kili into the room. "I have been very busy, you know, minding your uncle's business…" He shut the door.

"But you haven't told him yet, have you? If Thorin knew what Fili and I have been up to, he would disown us both!"

"I do not think that it will quite come to that, lad," Balin said. He motioned to the stool that Dwalin had so recently occupied. "Do not fear. I said that I would keep your secret, and I have. So far. I said that I would speak with you and now that you are here, we will have our talk, but what brings it on so suddenly? It cannot be as urgent as all that."

"There is a new Man at the farm," Kili told him, "at Nan's farm… I mean the place where Betta is staying. She knew this man upon the road and Fili has been jealous of him once already."

"Of a Man?" Balin said, smiling and shaking his head. "Your brother has never been jealous of anyone, Man or Dwarf, in his life. He would not start now."

"But he was!" Kili insisted. "I saw it myself, and he will be jealous again when he hears that Tom is nearby." His cheeks flushed red as he recalled his own reaction to the news, and the anger with which he had confronted Betta. "I felt something of the same when I first heard that the man had returned."

Balin stared at him and sank down into his chair. "Give me strength! Not you, too!" he cried.

"What? No!" Kili said earnestly, but he could not look the old dwarf in the eye. He stared down at his hands. "No, I do not love her, not like Fili does, but she is my friend. I know her. I know that she is not as strong as a dwarf-woman in this. The tall folk, they are not always steady…"

"Neither are all Dwarves," Balin reminded him.

Kili frowned and shook his head. "I mean steadfast," he corrected. "They fall in and out of love readily. But you confirm what I say. I have seen my brother jealous once before, and only for a brief moment, but I do not want to see it again. I am afraid for him, Balin. Betta is his weak point. I believe her when she says that she loves him and will not forget him, but if he should become jealous, he will not believe her words in my mouth. Fili, too, insists that he has not forgotten her, but when Betta hears it coming from me…"

"It is less easy to believe," Balin said, nodding. "I would agree except that last night you told me that he had promised to marry her. That should carry more than a little weight with them both."

"And it would, if she had agreed to it," Kili said. "But when he asked her, it was weeks ago. We were all in fear for our lives, and she thought that he was not honest. Even before that, when he had only said that he loved her, she said that Fili's marriage must have Thorin's approval."

"Well, that she will not get."

"So we told her," Kili said, nodding sadly. "She does not wait on Thorin now, I don't think, not now that she has seen him. She waits only for Fili's own word, and he cannot give that to her while he is locked up in here. She has always declared that he would forget her once he found himself back among dwarves. The longer she waits, the more it seems to her that he has… and the more likely he will think that she must forget him. He knows that her race does not have a long memory, especially when it comes to love."

Balin frowned and sat back in his chair. If it had been a dwarf-woman, there would be no difficulty, but the tall folk were indeed forgetful and inconstant. There was always room for doubt with them, and doubt – particularly when it came to love – did not sit well with any dwarf.

"A jealous dwarf is a dangerous dwarf," he muttered, then raised his eyes to Kili. "This Man, Tom… what does Fili know of him?" he asked.

"I have told him nothing as of yet," Kili said. "I have not had the chance. He has been at work since morning, and as far as he knows, Tom is on the road to Dunland. But I must tell him soon, as soon as I see him next." He told Balin quickly of the scene that had passed in town with the sullen Dunlander and Betta's part in it. "Both Thran and his nephews saw Betta and Tom together. Thran has promised not to gossip, but Borin and Norin…" he shook his head. "Word will get out, and when it does, I would rather Fili heard from me first."

"That is wise." Balin nodded.

"But once he knows," Kili went on, "he will want to see her. If he cannot find a secret way, then he will attempt the front door. The guards would not prevent him if he was determined, but they will report him to Thorin who will fall into a rage and have Fili locked up. He will chain him to the wall! I have heard him say that he would!" Kili buried his face in his hands.

"Well, now," Balin said, leaning forward to pat him reassuringly on the shoulder. "I do not think it will come to that, either." He sat back and was thoughtful again. He did not think it would come to locking Fili up with chains, but he would rather not put Thorin to the test.

Balin frowned for a long while and was silent. Kili watched him anxiously, pulling at the buttons on his sleeve. He knew better than to interrupt when his cousin was thoughtful.

"There may yet be a way…" Balin said finally. "Although, I do not like to go behind your uncle's back…"

"You would rather be plain with him?"

Balin shook his head. "No, I do not like that course either. There is no good choice in this matter, and nothing to be gained by wishing changes on the past." He frowned again, but only for a moment this time, and then he nodded to himself and turned back to his desk. Kili watched him open several drawers, rifling through each as he searched for something. He craned his neck to look.

Inside the drawers were many odds and ends, buttons and bent keys, the broken metal bowl of an old pipe. Finally, in one drawer, Balin reached back as far as his arm would go and his hand closed upon the thing he sought. He took it out.

"This, I think, will be our best help," he said, handing it to Kili. "This key is old, as old as the tunnels under these hills. It unlocks the iron door at the bottom of the north tower. You know the one, Kili. That tower was always off-limits to you and your brother, and so I am sure that you have explored every inch of it, top to bottom."

Kili nodded, sheepishly. "I tried to pick the lock on the door a few times, but it was better than my skill."

"Because that door leads outside the mountain," Balin told him. "On the other side, it is well-hidden and will not open without the key, so take care not to lose that. Thorin has a copy somewhere; I do not know why I kept this one, except that I found it a long time ago among some old belongings and I did not bother to throw it away." He shrugged his shoulders. "I cannot say whether the path is still good. No dwarf has used it since Thrain returned and rebuilt these halls. A hundred years ago, I recall that it was full of nettles and vine, but still passable. It wound up along a secret road into the mountains, but also from the door it crept down into the trees on the northeast facing. From there, you should be able to find the other path that leads over the hill."

Kili nodded. He knew that path, at least. He had followed it to Nan's farm, but he did not know that it was made by the lesser dwarves who sometimes went in secret to consult with Nan and buy her Orocarni herbs. Kili only knew that it was a sometimes convenient way to slip unseen down the hill to visit Betta.

"There, now," Balin said, resting his hands on his knees. "That is all that I have to say about that, save that you did not get this key from me. I do not want to know when you use it, or if you ever do, but after you are done with it, you will give it back to me. And do not think that you can fashion your own copy, Kili. I know you have plenty of stray keys jingling about your person, but that one will not copy. There is magic in it that is very old."

"How old can it be? You said that you found it among your belongings."

"I said that I found it among _old_ belongings, I did not say they were mine." He looked sharply at Kili, giving him the same schoolmaster's eye that he gave every dwarf under one hundred. "I should make you ask Fili about this," he said. "Your brother paid attention during his lessons. These halls are older than Thrain, Kili. What do you think they were before? Long before. Before even the sea split this range in two?"

Kili shrugged. "I thought they were the store rooms of Nagrod, or exploratory mines that Thrain widened and brought together over time."

Balin nodded. "That they were, but also they were so much more. Those were dark years before the hard-won peace of our present age, and the folk of these hills knew that they could not always trust to the strength of their halls. They had many routes of escape; some that ran deep into the underground, and others that let out far away from the city center. Should Nogrod ever be overrun, they might flee into these tunnels and be safe.

"It is a long ways from that city to the place where we sit now, to be sure, but they kept many hidden stores along the way. They knew their road and could outrun their enemy if they were followed or overwhelm him in the labyrinth of interconnected passages. But even if they were brought to the end of the road and hemmed in on all sides, still there was the secret door with only one key to open it. Some might escape that way and lock their enemies inside, buying time for their folk to flee above ground through the mountains and into the northern lands…"

Balin frowned, feeling the itch of some stray thought at the back of his mind, but he could not scratch it. Kili stared at him in amazement; this was nothing that he had ever heard before. Balin laughed. "Well, what is the use of a secret door if every dwarf knows that it is there?" he said. "I suppose that I might have kept it a secret myself, but we have little use for such an escape these days. I doubt that the Blue Mountains will ever be besieged again. These are Thorin's Halls now, and his nephews have as much a right to know their secrets as any."

Kili looked down at the key in his hand, holding it reverently. "Now, do not lose it!" Balin said.

"No!" he agreed. "No, and I know that Fili will not lose it, either. Thank you, Balin, thank you!" He jumped up and threw his arms around Balin's neck.

Balin laughed, but he said, "Do not thank me just yet. I can give you no help for the very real trouble you will be in if Thorin catches either one of you sneaking down to that woman. If you are caught, I cannot help you. You are old enough to suffer your consequences alone."

"Fili will not be caught, and no one will find the key, I promise," Kili said. "No one has ever found any of the keys that I…" he trailed off and his face was red. Balin winked at him.

"To bed with you now, lad," he said. "But if you will take one last piece of advice from an old dwarf, do not give your brother the key tonight. Tell him what I have said, if he is even awake when you reach him, but it is too late for visiting tonight. Hold on to it, and tomorrow… Well, perhaps tomorrow."

Kili readily agreed. It _was_ too late tonight, and Fili needed his sleep. He had only recently been released from his heavy workload, and he would want to be well-rested when he saw Betta again. Kili stood up to go, but at the door, he hesitated and looked back. "Balin?" he said slowly. "Will these still be Thorin's halls once Erebor is reclaimed?"

Balin shrugged. "Who can say what will be then? Perhaps there will be no more dwarves at Ered Luin. If the dragon can be driven out and the Lonely Mountain reclaimed, why not Moria next? or Gundabad? And we will have little use for the broken remnants of a forgotten city, once those kingdoms shine again."

Kili frowned and thought about that, but Moria was such a long ways away. He shook his head and bid his cousin goodnight then hurried back up the passageway. Balin shut and bolted the door behind him and leaned heavily against it. He did not think that he could survive another interruption. So much news at once and he was not as young as he used to be, but then he thought of his new-coming niece or nephew, and he smiled again.

Maybe things were not so bad after all.

* * *

**Well, here ends a truly miserable week in which I honestly didn't think that I'd have a chapter for you. I hope you like it.**

**I hope there'll be another one.**

**-Paint**


	15. The Darkest Hour Before Dawn

**It really does mean a lot to me to hear how much some of you look forward to each new chapter. It's what keeps me at the keyboard, plugging away. I hope that you continue to enjoy the story, and I'm sure that you've been looking forward for _this_ chapter as eagerly as I have ;)**

* * *

Kili ran through the empty passageways of Ered Luin holding tight to the key that Balin had given him. After their conversation last night, he had been anxious, afraid that their good and loyal cousin might decide after all that the best course – and indeed the more honest way – was to tell everything to Thorin and submit to his judgment. Kili had not yet decided for himself whether the exchange they had made, trading raw gold for pressed coin, was fair. It was not theft, that much at least he had settled in his mind, but it was not entirely honest to take the work of so many dwarven hands without asking. He could guess what Thorin would say.

Would they get help or harm from Balin? That was the question that he had hardly dared to ask, but this was help enough, and more than he had hoped for. Balin had kept their secret… so far, he said, but still! And he had given up this key to the secret door. Who would have thought that there were secret ways out of the Dwarfhome that Kili with all his cleverness had not yet discovered. He would give the key to Fili and show him the door, and then Fili would be able to go down to Betta, secretly and as often as he pleased. And Fili and Betta would…

Kili's feet faltered and he slowed his steps. And they would, what? Swear an oath of marriage, he hoped. Anything to end this treacherous doubt that assailed them. He did not know what ceremonies the tall folk performed, but he had stood up many times with his brother while Thorin presided over the weddings of dwarf-men and -women within Ered Luin. There was a lot of talk, a lot of tradition, the trading of rune stones or jewelry, and the braiding and rebraiding of hair and beard. The families of both parties would step forward to acknowledge and praise the oaths that their kin had sworn to each other and to swear oaths of family between themselves. Afterwards songs would be sung, feasts feasted upon and many fine gifts given not just to the couple but to everyone else who was there (and a few who were not). Even among the common dwarves down in the mines, a wedding was an important event, but for one of Thorin's own family, for Dwalin and Frei for instance, the celebration lasted many days and nights. Kili could not remember much of _that_ wedding beyond the initial oaths; the wine had flowed freely after that.

Kili stopped walking and leaned back against the cold wall. Fili would have no wedding. Who in the Dwarfhome would praise his choice to swear himself to a woman of the tall folk? Who would celebrate them? Not his uncle, certainly. Only Kili, and maybe Nan and Gilon, but they hardly counted.

He was not far from their rooms and knew that Fili would be back by now, fast asleep and probably snoring in his bed. He no longer needed to work late nights now that Thorin had lightened his load, but he continued to spend his evening hours laboring over Betta's gold pendant. Kili might have himself to blame for that. It was only after he had asked if it would hold a lock of hair that Fili had become determined to make it do so, but the locket had not been fashioned that way and he struggled to enclose it, to fit the small, clear-crystal window into place to protect both hair and a miniature portrait.

Fili wanted too much, Kili thought to himself as he stared into the darkness of the passageway. With more time to think, Kili guessed that his brother had begun to feel the journey to Erebor closing in upon him. He dreaded the day that Thorin would set out, knowing that he must go, too, either with his uncle or following after him against orders, but always leaving Betta behind. Fili worked at the pendant desperately, as if he thought that he might find a way to fit himself into the locket and be both on the road with Thorin and also with Betta at Ered Luin.

"And yet, he refuses to be with her _now_," Kili muttered. Betta had said that she should have gone back to the mountain to stand before the doors and demand that Fili recognize her. It would have gotten her nowhere, Kili knew, unless it were into the dungeons; but still, it would have been something, and maybe Fili would finally have been forced to act.

Betta had told him that she did not regret her past, but Kili was not as stubborn and she and his brother were. He found it very easy to regret many things, if only he had time to name them all; but mostly, he regretted the circumstances that had forced him to act in his brother's place. They were no longer young, not even Betta was young in her own years; they were not children playing at being married without knowing what marriage meant and what it entailed, and they could not plead ignorance either. Kili _did not_ love Betta, and Betta _could not_ love him, not while his brother held her heart. She had told him as much when he confronted her yesterday.

Yes, Kili had many things to regret. He regretted the anger that he had showed to her then, and the impulsive way that he had accused her. He regretted the almost-apology that he had tried to offer because it had forced her to say that the fault was her own…

Weakness, she had called it, a moment of weakness when Betta had been forced by circumstances to lean on Kili for his strength because Fili was not there. It was during a moment of weakness that they both had realized that Kili could only go so far pretending to be his brother, speaking his brother's words and giving his brother's gifts before the ruse was laid bare.

Kili shook his head and wrapped his hand around the key in his pocket. He stood up and started walking again. No more regrets. Fili would be with her soon; maybe not tonight, but he would visit her tomorrow, as soon as Kili could get him away from his work. Fili would be with her, and Kili could get well out of it. There would be no more uncertainty. The two lovers would state their cases plainly to each other, and Fili need never know how close to ruin they all had come.

Yes, he would be glad to be out of it, Kili thought to himself. Ever since that first night when he had sat silently by while his brother ducked into Betta's lonely tent, Kili had known he was inching into a tight corner, trapping himself between honesty and loyalty to his brother. It was only in recent days that he had realized just how close that corner had become. The walls had shrunk down upon him, day by day, so slowly that he did not notice it until he could hardly breathe; but still, he must go on holding his breath until Fili returned from the farm, consoled or disconsolate. If the one, then Kili would be free; if the other, he would be crushed.

.

Fili was fast asleep when Kili returned to their rooms. He considered waking his brother up to share the good news (and to tell him of Tom) but decided against it. _Let him sleep and I will tell him in the morning,_ he thought, as he made ready for bed and slipped under the covers. Balin was right and it would be better to wait. _If he knew what I have, he would go to see her tonight, and it is too late for visiting._

.

Kili slept fitfully that night, dreaming of gold and dragons and a magnificent wedding party, but the bride and groom were dead and all their family wore mourning clothes singed black by dragon's fire. It was a terrible dream, and he struggled all night to get out of it. When he finally woke, he found Fili already awake ahead of him. His brother was sitting down to pull on his boots, and as Kili sat up in his bed, he felt dizzy. A strange sense of recognition overwhelmed him and made him lay back down again. Had it not been he, Kili, who had woken first on the morning they slipped Betta into the south forge, the day they had opened that silver box for her? That day, had it not been Fili who woke haggard and confused, but that was what? Almost three months ago now?

"You tossed and turned all night, brother," Fili said. "Your muttering woke me from sleep and kept me awake until I got up to roll you over, yet even that was not enough to wake _you_. You have always slept the way a boulder falls: heavily." He smiled at his joke, but Kili did not smile. "You do not look well today, Kili. "Shall I call a healer?"

"I am well enough," Kili answered, sitting up and throwing back his blankets. "If I tossed and turned, it was only because you went to sleep before I could speak with you and I was forced to sleep on my thoughts. Fili, I have good news… and also bad news. Which would you hear first?"

"Neither," Fili said, standing up. "I slept late this morning and now I must hurry down into the mines. I have no time for news good or bad unless it is also quick, but your news never is." He watched Kili fumble for words and laughed. "You see? But I will see you at midday. We will share our meal together. It has been a long while since we have been able to do that while the sun is up, but Thorin has freed me to have time of my own. I will see you for dinner, and you will tell me then all the news that you have heard."

Kili shook his head. "I have to meet Fror," he said, "and I must take tools down to Thran at midday, but if you would only wait a moment and let me tell you…"

"I have no moments to spare," Fili said. "I will find you this afternoon. Farewell until then, dear brother." Fili smiled at his dismay. "Today is a good day, Kili, I know it, so do not go getting into trouble."

He waved cheerfully and was out the door, leaving Kili behind shaking his head. He must hope that no one spoke to Fili of Tom or mentioned the mysterious new apprentice at Gilon's forge. Why must Fili always be putting him off when he had something important to say!?

But Kili knew the answer to that without asking. His brother was devoted to his work in the mines, and to the miners who were his friends. Fili had overslept, and that was not like him, but it was very much him to put off his own pleasure in order to look after the safety of others. It was why Betta had been put off as long as she had. Fili refused to look for a way around the boulder in his path; he would rather cut through it or stubbornly refuse to go on. Now that Thorin had removed the greatest obstacle between him and his woman, lightening his workload and freeing his time, Fili was able to turn his thoughts to Betta… but only after he had seen to the mines.

Kili sighed. Had Fili always been this good at building barriers between himself and what he wanted? He had never seen his brother as happy as he was when Betta was smiling at him, and the only thing that seemed to make Betta smile these days were thoughts of Fili. Kili was determined that Fili and Betta would be happy together, even if only for a few weeks. He would go before them with axe and sword in hand if he had to.

He stood up and began to dress for the day. Betta was right, and they had little time to waste. The walls were closing in.

.

At noon, Kili drove the wagon to town and got from Thran his sworn statement that neither he nor his nephews had spoken of Betta to anyone in the mountain. After he returned the wagon, he went looking for Fili. His brother had not kept his word; he was still at work in the forge even though it was after midday and Kili was very near to dragging him bodily away from his work before he laughed and agreed to go.

"To dinner, then," Fili said, putting his mark on the last order of the day and handing it off to the nearest foreman. He followed his brother into the tunnels. "To the Great Hall!" he said, as he turned left down the passage, but Kili caught his arm and pulled him right.

"No," he said, "There will be dwarves there. I have things to say that cannot be said among others. To our own rooms first, Fili, and then if you still want to eat, we'll go down."

Fili gave him a puzzled look but did not protest. He knew that Kili would have refused to say more even if he was asked, and so he did not ask. Not until they were safely behind the closed door of their room, the latch was turned and Fili had grudgingly agreed to sit down on his bed, did Kili agree to speak. He began at the beginning, the afternoon of the day before when he had first heard the news of Tom's arrival with the caravan from Dunland.

"What! That Man is back again?" Fili cried, and stood up but Kili only rolled his eyes and pushed him to sit down again. "I thought that we had shaken him," Fili grumbled. "Well, I will see to that beardless snake myself. I will…"

"You will do nothing until you have heard all that I have to say," Kili said, impatiently, but he kept a wary eye on his brother, seeing the green gleam of jealousy in Fili's eyes. "Tom is no competition to you. No, listen! I have already spoken with Betta and asked her about him. She calls him her brother and a child that she pitied. I think…" Kili hesitated, but he had her permission to say, "She sees in him her brother, Annandil. The youngest one, the one who drowned in the river before he had seen his tenth year."

Fili frowned. "I remember," he said, nodding. He remembered the tale that Betta had told, full of guilt and grief and the sorrow that had torn the first hole in her family. He remembered, too, the many times upon their journey that he had been forced to imagine losing his own little brother. "I do not know how she thinks that she can replace him with a stranger, but maybe in her heart she can. Her race is very different from ours and their loyalties lie in many places, not always with their own kin…"

"She is not _replacing_ her brother," Kili said. "She is fashioning for herself a new family: mother, father, brother and all. If she could love only those who looked like her, then she could not love you, Fili. Leave it be. Tom is no threat to you."

But Fili's frown was deep and angry. He was not reassured. "You may be right, but what she tells you is not always what she feels in her heart. She holds her secrets close, and I must see her to know if it is true. I have left her alone for too long."

"That is what I have been saying," Kili said, tasting the bitterness in his words. "Now, you have heard my bad news. Here is the good: you _will_ see her! You will see her tonight, even, if that is what you want. I spoke to Balin again yesterday and have been running off my feet for you, Fili, but it was worth it. Will you eat first, or shall I show you what I have found?"

He smiled until Fili stood up and shook him, demanding to be shown. Kili laughed and led him out of their rooms, taking him far into the abandoned passages and right up to the base of the northernmost tower. He showed Fili the closed door and its thick, iron lock.

"This way leads to a secret path outside the mountain," he said. "Balin told me about it. It will lead you to Nan's farm and no one will see you go out."

Immediately, Fili tried the door, and Kili stifled his smile at his brother's irritation when it refused to open for him. Fili slid his fingers over the lock and shook his head. "Blocked at every turn," he muttered. But where there was a door… "There must be a key," he said, looking at his brother.

Kili smiled. "Indeed there is," he said, holding up the key and laughing at Fili's surprise and outrage. "Do not blame me!" he said, holding up his hands. "It is not often that I can play a trick on my own brother, and it is even less often that I see you surprised. If I cannot be there for your reunion with Betta, then I must enjoy this moment as best I can. The key fits the lock, and you will need it also on the other side, so do not lose it! Balin says that there cannot be another made."

Fili took the key from his brother's hand and stared at it in amazement, then he laughed and threw his arms around him, crying, "I knew that you would come through for me, brother! I will see Betta tonight! No, I will go and see her now! If they come looking for me, tell them… tell them that I am anywhere. A thousand places at once, and let them search! They will not find me." He turned and reached out, intending to unlock the door, but Kili caught his arm.

"Fili, wait." As much as he hated to break in on his brother's happiness, it was still only an hour past noon. "If you are going to see Betta, then you must eat first, for I doubt that you will return before nightfall. You will want all your strength to get up and down that hill. Besides, it is still early, and someone may indeed come looking for you. Better to wait until the evening meal. We will go down to the Great Hall for our dinner and you will let it be known that you are tired and will take an early sleep, then no one will be surprised when they do not see you at supper, too."

Kili cast a critical eye over his brother's coal-stained clothes and shook his head. "You might have a bath, as well," he said. "Comb out your hair and beard, too, before you go. What will Betta think when she sees you looking as if you took a tumble down the coal chute?"

Fili frowned and looked down at himself. He ran a hand through his tousled beard. It was true that he had come directly from the mines. His face was still smudged with coal dust and his hair full of wax and oil dripped down from the lanters, not to mention the sweat of his brow.

"You are right, Kili," he said. "What would I do without you to look after me, brother? And Betta, too! She will thank you for being so careful."

They left the north tower, and Fili looked longingly back toward the door.

"She might thank me for suggesting the bath," Kili said, "but I must stay behind and put off anyone who asks after you. She will be disappointed that I do carry you down… No, do not ask! Her thoughts and eyes will be so full of you that she will not waste a moment to think of me. I am glad," he said, and he was.

They followed Kili's plan that afternoon and went down to eat a hearty meal with the few of their cousins still in the Great Hall. Thorin was there, too, and had a few minutes to spare for his nephews. It was easy for Fili to appear tired, for he was, and before he had said a word, Thorin was already insisting that he needed more sleep.

"I will do, uncle," Fili said. "I have one or two things yet to finish today, but I will go to my rooms early. You will not miss me at the evening meal?"

"No, indeed! Rest up, Fili. We will want you strong for the journey ahead!" Thorin said with a wink.

Fili glanced at his brother, but Kili only shrugged. He had not been told, but it seemed that Thorin had finally made up his mind.

There was no suspicion in the Great Hall. Only Balin looked twice at them, but he was in on their game and did not give them away. The brothers ate their meal in good spirits and then Fili retired to wash himself up and comb his beard. He changed his clothes and it was late in the day before he bid his brother an early good-night. He kissed the key in his hand before thrusting it deep into his pocket and slipping out the door. He made for the north tower as quickly and quietly as he could go.

Once Fili had gone, Kili let out a deep breath. He lay back on his bed and closed his eyes. In his thoughts, he followed his brother's progress through the tunnels and down the hill. Now, he would be out the door, now at the foot of the mountain, now in the trees. Now, he would be at the farm…

Kili sighed and turned on his side, drifting slowly into sleep. He had had a long, troubled night before this and would imagine no further along Fili's road. There was nothing left to do but wait for his brother to return and tell him what happened next.

.

Fili walked alone down the dark passages. He had worn soft shoes instead of his heavy boots, not wanting to risk being heard and stopped, and he did not carry a lamp to give himself away. He did not feel his brother's thoughts on him; the walls were too thick and he was not superstitious. Fili retraced the path that he had taken with Kili only hours ago and soon had reached the north tower. He felt for the iron door with his hands. His fingers found the lock, but he hesitated.

For the past two weeks, whenever he had had a moment to spare for himself, he had thought of _this_ moment, of being free to visit Betta, but now that he had come to it, he hesitated. Why? He had had no sight of sun or sky for two weeks, and behind this door was the open hillside. He was a dwarf, and it was not something that he should want, to breathe clean air, free of smoke and coal dust, to know that there was no roof over his head, no walls to either side of him or at his back… He should not love a human woman.

Had he ever felt truly at home under stone? He had been born in a stone hut built built above ground, nestled among the hills of Dunland. The first time that he and his brother had gone with their mother, riding a wagon up the Greenway and west to Ered Luin, and he had stepped through the wide front door of the Dwarfhome, his mouth hanging open, his eyes wide and amazed even though the halls had been only half carved and most of the walls were unfinished stone. That feeling of awe, it had been like coming home.

But, no, Fili shook his head. Erebor was home, not Ered Luin. It had to be. For Thorin.

He fit the key into the lock and felt something like the shock of heat when a red-hot sliver of iron sparked against bare skin. The key turned and the tumblers rolled over. He had to put his shoulder into it to force the door to open. For many years, Fili admitted, Ered Luin had felt less and less like home to him. The more that Thorin spoke of the Lonely Mountain, the more eager he was to go there and abandon these half-finished halls, the less comfortable they were to him. He sought out the mines, deep and dark, and the comfort of his own thoughts. Home was with your family, Fili knew; rock and stone did not matter.

The sun was setting on the hillside when Fili emerged from the mountain and pushed shut the door behind him. He took a moment to search for the keyhole on the other side and make sure that he could find it; when he returned it would be dark. Balin was right and the path was overgrown with an hundred years of nettles and brush, their branches knotted together, but Fili forced his way through, doing as little damage as he could. In the coming days, he would be less careful about covering the path that he would use so often.

He reached the trees and passed through them, reached the hill and walked down it, made his way toward the farm from the west. He did not want to be seen leaving the mountains, and he hoped to reach the farm before he was spied from that direction as well. He wanted to surprise Betta, and if Tom were there, to catch the Man unaware.

It seemed a lifetime since he had seen the woman he loved. When they parted in the Great Hall, she had been sickly and pale, exhausted by their long journey and suffering with the pain and grief of losing her right hand. How was she now? Would she be glad to see him or angry that he had stayed so long away?

He should have brought something for her, he thought to himself. The pendant was not finished, but there had been gold coins in a pouch in his coat pocket. He reached for them, but the coat had been left behind in his room.

The sun drifted down toward the horizon, and blue shadows from the mountains behind him stretched out like arms to hold him back, but he sped on before them, outpacing their outstretched fingertips. He reached the farm while the sky was light, and the eastern hills shone like gold beneath the setting sun. They were red where the deep shafts of light cut through the dark clouds that had begun to roll in from the west. It was the first time that Fili had been to Nan's farm, and it was much larger than he thought it would be. He passed the barn first and made for the cabin, but before he had gone far, a young man with sandy hair stepped out of the forge.

Wiping a streak of soot across his sweating brow, exhaustion was written into every line of Tom's body, and his arms hung limp at his sides. This was only his second day of work, and his shirt was soaked in sweat from the heat of the forge. He did not see Fili right away, not until he was nearly next to him, and then he looked up – or down, as it were – and let out a cry of surprise. This was not the angry, dark-haired dwarf, but he drew back just the same. Fili carried no sword, but his fists were weapons enough if he decided to use them, and Tom was too tired to put up a fight.

"M- Master... ah, Dwarf!" he stammered and tried to bow the way that he had seen Betta do it.

Fili crossed his arms and looked the Man up and down. As a distant silhouette slinking through the shadows of their camp, Tom had been a figure of exaggeration, a temptation to Betta, and an incitement to jealousy for Fili himself, but up close, he was as Kili had said, a child. A young man not yet grown into his first beard.

"So, Tom, I see that you have found us again," Fili said, smiling, but his smile and his relief did not lessen the cold anger in his eyes. This Man had caused him too much grief for them to ever be friends. "You have met my brother, but not yet myself, I think."

Tom shook his head. "I have seen you," he said, "but we were not introduced. Are you looking for Betta? I thought that it was the other one who loved her, but then she told me…"

"Where is she?" Fili demanded. He did not like hearing her name spoken by this scrap of a boy.

Tom flinched and pointed across the field. Fili looked over his shoulder, and by the time he looked back, all he saw was the heel of the Tom's boot disappearing back into the forge.

Laughing to himself, Fili wondered how he could ever have been worried about that one. He crossed the yard, heading for the field that Tom had showed him. It might be that the Man had lied, or that he had given false information out of fear, but Fili did not think so. It took a strong will to lie to the face of Thorin's nephew.

He was only a dozen yards past the cabin and not yet into the field when he looked up and saw a figure rising above the crest of the hill ahead of him. He stopped short and stood wondering, feeling as if he had walked into a dream. Almost, he had, for he had dreamed of this reunion many times.

Behind a low rise to the north of Nan's cabin were a small wood and a shallow stream. Betta had been foraging for spring greens for Nan's kitchen, and she returned over the hill, walking towards the cabin. She did not see Fili where he stood, blending blond hair and brown shirt into the yellow grass. A basket was hooked over her right arm and she held her skirts in her hand to keep from tripping over them – the new trousers would not be ready for many days yet. Fili had never seen her in a skirt, and from where he stood, she seemed to float upon the hillside, a leaf blown on the wind. Her long hair was a cloud of night behind her, and the grass and wild flowers parted in waves before her. The dress was one of Nan's hand-me-downs, sewn in dwarf-fashion, and from a distance with the evening sun dazzling his eyes, Fili almost thought that she was a dwarf-woman.

Betta walked toward the cabin, and was almost past him. He did not move or speak but felt the instant that her eyes touched on him. He saw her footsteps falter and her lips part suddenly in surprise. If she made a sound, he did not hear it; she did not cry out or run to him as she had with Kili on his first visit to the farm. She changed her course like a ship on the sea and smiled at him.

Her step was no quicker than it had been before, but Fili did not mind. He was patient. This was the moment during the hunt that he liked best, when he stood with his weapons put away and watched the gentle doe approach, nearer and nearer until he could see the color of her eyes. It was the still, silent moment of recognition between two creatures before the twig snapped or the leaves rustled and one of them sprinted away. Gladly, Fili would have stretched that moment into many, drawing out the seconds that it took for Betta to reach him. She stood near enough that he could smell the pinesap on her skin and see the traces of damp soil on her fingers from the garlic bulbs that she had dug out of the field. Her eyes were grey, and they sparkled as they searched his face, relearning every line of his expression.

"Fili," she said, the color rising to her cheeks. "Kili said that you would be here last night. You are late."

He smiled. "But I have thought of you every day," he said, "does that not count for something?"

He held out his hand to her. He blinked, and she was in his arms. When had she put down her basket? When had she thrown her arms about his neck? He wondered for only a moment, and then his arms were around her, too, and he was holding her close, kissing her eyes, her lips, her hair, and she kissed him as many times in return. He heard her laughter in his ears. The days that they had spent apart seemed to melt away. He tasted salt on his lips, from his tears or hers, he could not say, and it did not matter. Here was where he belonged. This was home.

* * *

**Well, that did it for me. I needed a smile, and I hope you're smiling, too :)**

**-Paint**


	16. Meeting The Parents

**Sorry this one's a bit late coming out. I had lots of work which led to lots of stress which led to brain-stabbing, migraine-y pain (and then two days of brain-numbing migraine hangover). Isn't life grand! But better late than never, right. Hope you like.**

* * *

It was several minutes before Betta felt a sharp pain and realized that her arm had been caught between them. She held on to Fili for as long as she could, until she felt the sting of tears in her eyes and forced herself to pull away. She had not been careful enough; her wounds were nearly healed, and Nan complimented them every day, but the stump of her arm was still tender and could not bear hard use. Fili looked at her strangely, and she forced herself to smile, but she felt the tension in her face and drew her arm closer to her chest.

Fili touched her elbow gently and looked up at her. "I am sorry," he said. "I should be more careful with you."

She could not help but laugh at that. "No," she said, "it is _I_ who should be more careful with myself. If my arm is damaged, then it is _I_ who will be frowned at and chided by Nan, not you… or, maybe not you." She looked at him thoughtfully, wondering what Nan would say, and then she lifted her eyes to look over his head.

"I had not realized…" she said.

Fili frowned and looked up and then down at his feet. He had worn his soft shoes to slip out of the mountain unheard, but Betta's thin-soled boots were at the cobbler's shop being patched up and resoled. She had borrowed a pair of Nan's heavy boots to go stomping through the muddy banks of the stream. Fili had always known that Betta was taller than he, even if she was short for one of her race, but he had not had time to really notice the difference until now.

Betta laughed again, anxiously this time, and lowered her gaze to his face. She looked hard at him, determined to learn his looks, to store up memories of him for the next time that he left her and stayed away for too many days.

"How long are you here?" she asked, expecting his visit to be as short as Kili's had been.

Fili shrugged his shoulders. "A few hours, at least," he said. "How long will you have me?" His expression was uncertain; he did not quite believe that she would want him back.

"I would have you forever," Betta told him, "a lifetime or more, but I will be satisfied with a few hours. For now. Have you eaten? Nan will want these for the stew pot." She bent down to retrieve her basket from the ground, but Fili took it up before she could touch it. He hooked the handle over his left arm and offered her his right.

Betta took his arm. "Will you stay and eat with us?" she asked.

He hesitated, looking back toward the forge. "Will your friend Tom be at the table?"

"Nan does not trust him yet. He is not allowed inside the house, not even to bring in the wood or to help Gilon fill the coal bin. Tom eats his meals in the barn where he makes his bed…" She searched Fili's eyes and added, slowly, "Kili said that you would be jealous…"

He pressed her hand. "I am not jealous of that creature," he said, though it was not true. They walked toward the cabin, arm in arm. "I do not like him, nor am I good friends with either of your kind hosts here. I sent you to them, and I trust them to take care of you, but Gilon and I have fought too many battles over trade and the cost of the ore we sell to him. Nan is…" He sighed and shook his head.

"She is exiled," Betta said firmly. Fili glanced at her. "I know it. She has told me as much. Kili will hardly look her in the face, but you, Fili, you must be friends with her, and with Gilon, too, for me." She saw his doubtful look and smiled. "Did your brother not tell you? Nan calls me daughter now, and she intends for me to inherit the farm after her."

Fili stopped short and stared at her. He began to say that he had not heard but hesitated. Perhaps Kili _had_ said something about it to him, but during those days when Fili had been too busy to listen and had had other thoughts in his mind. He did not like to admit that he had not heard.

"I am glad for you," he said, honestly. "I am glad that you have a home now, and one that will keep you at Ered Luin. I had been worried that once your arm was healed you would go wandering again. I worried that I would not be able to find you after I returned from…" He let his words trail off. Would they always be ending their sentences on half-hearted notes such as these? On words that could not be spoken?

Betta knew what he meant and he did not need to say it. Her heart was still glad to see him and her skin was warm where his hand touched her, but the rest of her was cold. The sun had sunk behind the rim of the Ered Luin, and evening shadows fell over them. They reached the cabin as Betta began to shiver, and she took her hand from his arm so that he would not feel it. She opened the door without knocking.

Of course she did, Fili shook his head at himself. She belonged here; he did not.

He felt his feet stick at the threshold, but Betta was inside and he could not resist being drawn in after her. He could not let another door close between them now that he had found her again.

"Look who has come to visit me, Nan," Betta called happily as Fili closed the door behind them.

Nan was in the kitchen at the table, chopping the last of winter's withered potatoes. She smiled when she looked up but her good cheer vanished as soon as she recognized Fili. The warm, comfortable air in the cabin grew cold and tense as the dwarf-woman's face hardened into a mask of scorn and anger.

"Welcome Master Fili? I suppose that I must if he is your guest," she said, with no welcome in her words. "When Tom told Gilon that there was a Dwarf about, I had hoped that he meant the other one."

Betta sighed. She had known that Nan would be less forgiving of this dwarf than she was of his brother. Nan was not fond of any of Durin's kin, but Kili had not been treated badly the few times that Nan had seen him, and Betta had hoped that Fili would be tolerated as well.

Whatever offence Fili might have taken at his rude welcome, he swallowed, and was determined to be polite for Betta's sake. He stepped forward and bowed – a little stiffly, but still – in the direction of the dwarf-woman.

"I will admit that there has been little friendship between our two homes, Nan," he said, "and not every grudge can be put aside, but I can no longer justify my scorn for you. I have made my own choices and there is no longer any judgment in me." A little of the anger in Nan's eyes fell away, but she still frowned at him. He glanced at Betta and pressed on. "If my actions have caused any hurt to you or your family, I regret them now and ask for peace between us. I did only what I thought best for my own folk."

His last remark did not sit well with Nan, but she did not argue with him. In no hurry, she wiped her hands and stepped out from behind the table. Betta watched in amazement as the woman performed a strange sort of bowing curtsey, lowering her head as she crossed an arm over her waist and bent gracefully at the knee. Betta finally understood the strange look that the dwarf at the shop had given her when she had imitated Fili's bow. Dwarf-women, she realized, had their own form of courtesy.

Nan stood up straight again, but her look was cold, and she shook her head. "For my daughter, we will have peace between us," she told Fili, "but I do not love you. Or your kin." She turned back to her table to finish her work on the stew.

Betta knew that she must be satisfied with that, and it was more than she had expected. With more confidence, she turned to the other side of the room. "Well, Gilon? Will _you_ not greet my guest? He has come a long way to visit us." She said with more cheer and less fear in her voice.

Fili followed her look and was caught by surprise. He had not seen Gilon sitting in his chair by the fire; although, how he had missed the six feet of tall man, he could not say. Gilon stood up, and Fili felt his neck ache as he looked up at him. it was not the first sight that he had had of the blacksmith, but always before they had been on opposite sides of the negotiating table with Fili standing beside his uncle, learning from Thorin's example, and Gilon joining the head tradesmen of the town.

Gilon nodded to Fili and crossed his arms, looking him over carefully. There was more welcome in his eyes than Nan had shown, but he was wary of Betta's new friend. "I will gladly greet any guest of yours, Betta," he said, "but I hope that in the future your friends will refrain from threatening my apprentice's health."

"I voiced no threat to the lad," Fili said, amused that his few words could be construed as threatening.

"Did you not?" Gilon was not convinced, but he shrugged his broad shoulders and smiled. "Well, that boy is as skittish as a newborn calf, and Dwarves can be… ah, but we are friends now, are we not? And soon to be family, too."

"I, ah… are we?" Family was too strong a word for Fili to stomach just yet, at least as it described this Man and that dwarf-woman. He looked to Betta for rescue.

It was not many Men - or any, really - who could say that they had reduced Prince Fili to squirming, but Gilon had done it. Betta smiled. "We are all friends here," she said, but was careful not to look at Nan when she said it. "That is enough for now."

She took the basket from Fili and carried it to the kitchen table. "Will you let me set another place at the table, Nan? Fili has yet to eat, and I think that he will be hungry tonight."

.

The evening meal was a tense affair, and Fili was not at all comfortable with the looks he was given. Gilon, at least, was cheerful. He talked vaguely of his work in the forge, of Tom's growing confidence at the bellows, and wondered aloud which field would be best to till for Betta's seeds. Fili bit his tongue more than he spoke, not wanting to say anything that might spark anger in either of his hosts; he feigned happiness for Betta, to save her from embarrassment.

Betta seemed hardly to notice her adoptive-parents' guarded looks; more than once, Nan had to remind her of her food. Betta had only one hand to use, and it was employed most often in reaching under the table to touch Fili's hand that rested on his knee. Eventually, Nan cleared her throat one too many times, and Betta was forced to attend to her meal. Fili smiled at her. Slowly, he stretched out his hand under the table and rested it upon Betta's knee. She smiled back at him, and Nan frowned sternly at them both, but Fili did not remove his hand.

The company and conversation left much to be desired by him, but he was with Betta and the food was excellent. His praise of it was honest; Nan was a good cook. She used the spices of the eastern lands, and Fili wondered how she had managed to make them grow half a world away from their native soil. Still, foreign or not, it was dwarf food, and the meat was heartier than anything that might have otherwise graced the table of a tall Man's home. It was no wonder that Gilon had grown to such a stout and strong man if he ate like this every day.

Hearing Gilon's talk of the forge and the cost of running it, Fili quickly turned the conversation toward a more neutral topic and asked after Betta's health. Nan was more forthcoming with that information, and Fili was glad to hear, as well as to see for himself, that she had improved considerably in the two weeks since he had seen her last. As much as he had enjoyed the food, he might have satisfied any hunger he had in feasting his eyes on Betta's face alone. The color had returned to her cheeks, and her hair had grown long and soft with regular washing. She had regained all the weight that she had lost in the north, and then some, and Fili thought to himself that she looked much better for it. She smiled more and laughed often, but he guessed that this was due more to his visit than to her health; certainly, Gilon seemed constantly amazed to hear her laugh. Kili had been right: Fili should have come to see her sooner.

After supper, Gilon asked Fili to stand with him by the fire while the women cleared the table. Fili hesitated, but Betta had already moved into the kitchen with Nan, and he knew that this was less a matter of course than a way for Gilon to get him alone for a private conversation – or for Nan to have Betta alone for a talk about Fili.

It was a struggle for him to walk away, especially when he saw the smile drop from Betta's face as she listened to Nan. Fili could not make out anything that the dwarf-woman said. Though he watched her mouth carefully, she hid her words from him.

"Do you have your own pipe?" Gilon asked, taking Fili's shoulder and turning him to face the fire. "No, well you may borrow this one of mine. I have some good leaves fresh from The Shire and waiting to be shared. I do good business with the Hobbits and have done for years."

Fili accepted the pipe and the leaf gladly because turning toward the man for his light meant that he might also watch Betta out of the corner of his eye. The Shire weed was sweeter than what the dwarves smoked in their own halls, but he could not fault the flavor of it.

"We do not do much business with Hobbits at Ered Luin," Fili admitted, "but my cousin has traded with them on occasion."

"I know it," Gilon said. "If your folk traded there more, there would be less coin for us."

"We have business enough without them," Fili said, keeping his eyes on the fire.

Gilon frowned and was silent for a long while. "Well, they are an honest and resourceful folk," he said, forcing himself to speak gently again. "But they are wary, and I think that I am a bit too tall for their comfort." He laughed as he looked down at Fili and sat down in his own chair again.

Fili took a deep breath. He was not used to guarding his tongue, but he must make a good impression here. He glanced toward the kitchen and caught Betta's eye. She did not look happy, but she smiled when she saw him. He watched her, impressed at the effortless way that she balanced what she carried on her maimed arm, using forearm and elbow in place of her missing hand. If he had not known her better, he might have thought that she did not miss it. Fili flexed his right hand and wondered how long it would have taken him to learn to do without it. Much longer than she. He could not imagine wielding one sword at a time, not being able to throw his knives or swing his heaviest hammer.

"Take a seat, Master Fili," Gilon said.

He tore his eyes from Betta and did as the man asked without thinking. He did his best to pay attention to what Gilon was saying rather than strain his ears toward the conversation in the kitchen, but he caught a few words from Nan.

"...you must know before you swear to him…"

"You are welcome to visit us," Gilon told him, "as often as Betta will allow it, and to stay for as long as she will have you stay. This house is hers, too, and you may come and go as you please, by her leave."

"Will your wife allow it?" Fili asked, and Gilon gave him a look well-worn by husbands the world over. Fili thanked him. He knew that it was _only_ because of Betta that he was allowed inside the cain, and he wondered how Kili had been received by these people. Of course, Kili would not have stayed long enough or late enough to require their welcome, and it was not Kili who made trade decisions and enforced Thorin's rule with the Men of the town. Nan would have no reason to hate him, unless she begrudged his investment in the town pubs.

"It will never be as often or for as long as _I_ would have it be," Fili said, sending a wobbling ring of smoke from his pipe floating up toward the ceiling. He had none of Thorin's skill, with smoke rings or with Men. "I cannot be gone long from the mountain. I cannot risk being missed or, what would be worse, being found here."

Gilon nodded. "It was easier for us," he said, quietly, looking back toward his wife bustling about the kitchen. "She had no family to object, and my parents were already old. I could manage them, though it pained me to do so…"

Fili watched the man's rough, red hand tighten into a fist, and he wondered how much managing a pair of aging parents could need. "I will manage my own family," Fili said firmly. "Besides, I have my brother on my side."

"So I have seen."

Fili looked at him, but before he could ask, Betta joined them by the fire and Nan was with her. There were only two chairs, and Fili stood up, giving his up for Nan if she wanted it. He winked at Betta, and she smiled.

Nan frowned at him. She did not sit down, but she did not invite Fili to sit again either. "Betta tells us that you are going on a journey soon, Master Fili," she said, but her tone made it clear that his title was a mere formality with her. "When do you plan to leave us?" She did not mean tonight, and there was only one woman meant by her use of 'us'.

Fili glanced at Betta and she would not look at him, but he trusted that she had not revealed what little she knew of Thorin's plans for Erebor. Nan was a shrewd dwarf-woman, and Gilon carried to her all the news that he picked up in town. The folk in the mountain brought a great deal of trade to the region, and they were a large source of gossip among Men. Nan was searching for more reliable news.

"I _will_ be going on a journey," Fili agreed, "but I do not know when or how soon I will leave. It will be a long journey, and a great deal of preparation is needed before I can go." He turned his eyes on Betta. "There have been a few unexpected delays, and I think… I hope that a few more will prevent us from leaving this year."

Betta at him in surprise, and he expected to see hope or happiness in her eyes, but there was only dismay and fear. Nan saw it, too.

"Whether you go this year or next," Nan pressed him, "you will be gone a long while, many months at least?" He stared at her without speaking, but that did not stop her. "And you will not go alone. Many others will go with you… your brother will go, too?"

"Perhaps." Fili knew that he would have to be careful from now on. Nan was sharper than he had guessed.

"A long journey, very far from here… beyond Hithaeglir, I suppose?"

"I said that it would be long," Fili agreed. He frowned at her and refused to say more. From one of the tall folk, he might have expected this interrogation. Men used sly words and sneaking questions to get you to say more than you wanted to say, but among dwarves, it was considered vulgar in the extreme to pry into business that was not your own.

"You have been among the tall folk too long, Nan," Fili said quietly.

The dwarf-woman's eyes lit up with anger, but Betta stepped between them. She turned her back on Fili so that he could not see her face, but he heard her sorrow when she said, "It is what he must do, Nan. Do not ask him about it."

Her words were firm, but still, Fili was surprised to see Nan back down so quickly. He noticed that Betta was holding her right arm at the elbow and when she stepped aside and he could see her face again, he saw that her cheeks were pale and there was pain in her eyes. Her wounded arm still pained her, and his bitter words to Nan had only increased her suffering.

"I am sorry," he said, touching her arm.

She smiled at him and shook her head. "It is nothing," she said. "Only an arm."

"I will change that bandage now," Nan said, going to a nearby cabinet and taking down a bowl of bandages from the top shelf. She took several bottles of ointment from the cupboard and carried it all to the dinner table.

"I will do that for her," Fili said, smiling at Betta, but Nan scoffed at him. He looked at her in surprise. "You think that I cannot do it?" he demanded, exhausted by her rudeness. She had struck one too many blows to his pride. "I cared for Betta long before you knew her name, Exile. And I will…"

"Nan will do this for me," Betta interrupted him before he could say worse. Her smile was strained and her fingers were cold when she took his hand from her shoulder. All joy had gone from her eyes, and he recognized the grief that he saw. He knew what she would say before she said it.

"You will want to leave us now, Fili, won't you? I will walk you to the hill."

"It is too cold for you outside," Nan told her.

"It is too cold for me in here," Betta answered, angrily.

Fili was ashamed to be the cause of sharp words between them. "I am sorry," he said, to both of them, but he bowed to Nan first. "I have a few hours left and would like to stay longer, if I am still welcome." He forced himself to look at Nan and swore that he would abide by her decision, even if it was Betta's word that he wanted.

Nan did not look kindly on him in spite of his courtesy. "_I_ am the healer in this house," she said, "and you are no prince here, Fili." She looked away from him, and added quietly with a pointed look at Betta, "This is my house, but Betta's room is her own. If you are not ready to leave, then go there, and stay as long as she will have you."

Fili felt his jaw tighten. It went against his pride to put up with an exiled dwarf-woman's insolence, but she was right and this was her home, not his. He must be respectful of her rights.

"Please, Fili," Betta said quietly. "I have more to say to you, if you will wait…"

He nodded. "I will wait for you, as long as need be," he said. "Which is yours?" In the long front room, besides the front door, there were three others evenly spaced along the back wall.

"It is the farthest door," Gilon said, standing up from his chair once again. He made a point of keeping well out of his wife's business. "You are right, Betta, and it has grown cold again tonight. Perhaps your friend would be kind enough to help me carry embers to your room so that it will be warm and ready for your sleep."

Fili did not quite understand what he was meant to do, but while Nan began to unwrap the bandages around Betta's injured arm, Gilon handed him a coal pan and a pair of tongs. He took the hottest embers from the fireplace and followed the Man to Betta's bedroom. He hoped that he would not be alone with Gilon for long; he had already fought with Nan and did not want to risk straying back into old grudges with Betta's father, too.

Once the two men had gone, Nan turned back to Betta. She had the bandages off and began to clean the swollen folds of skin over her wrist. Even the deepest lacerations were closed now and growing their silver scar tissue. The skin flaps were laid down almost smooth.

"You did not need to be rude to him," Betta said.

"He is a proud one, that dwarf," Nan said, but her voice was gentle now.

"It is my understanding that most dwarves are proud." Betta looked toward the closed door to her own room; she did not want to look down at her blunted arm.

"He was not exaggerating when he said that his choices within the mountain have caused us much harm. If it were not for his uncle's anger, I might have cared for many dwarf-women and not only the women of the tall folk in town. Gilon's business, too, has suffered from their greed. It was Fili who chose to set up the dwarves' shop in town."

Gilon had come out of Betta's room in time to heard her. He shut the door before he said, "I do not begrudge the dwarves of Ered Luin their profit. No more than I begrudge the farmer who sells his wheat at a better price than mine." He stepped up to Nan and put a hand on her shoulder. "Let the old anger die, _zigilus_. It is not this lad's fault." He left them and sat down in his chair, grunting as he forced his stiff knee to bend for the third time that night.

Nan nodded to her husband, but the set of her jaw made it clear that she had not given up her anger. Betta knew already that Dwarves held their grudges close. She smiled, and then she laughed. Nan looked at her strangely.

"When we travelled in the north," Betta explained, "Fili and I promised each other many times that we would have a truce and peace between us, but not a day went by that we did not break our truce and begin to argue again. Kili was nearly maddened by us. You and Fili, you argue as we did."

Nan smiled, but she shook her head. "No, not as you did," she said, "for there is no chance that _I_ will fall in love with that dwarf."

"Indeed, not!" Gilon cried out from his place by the fire.

Betta laughed with Nan, but her eyes were still on the door to her room. She did not forget that Fili waited for her. The folded skin of her arm was clean and dry, and Nan smoothed a soothing ointment over all. Betta risked a look down at her blunted wrist. She had never been a vain woman, because she had never been beautiful, and even when she had had two hands of her own, they were nothing to admire. Her fingers were been thick and calloused, more often dirty than clean, and her nails broken by the hard work that she put them to, but the ruin of her right arm brought tears to her eyes long after she should have accepted her loss.

She looked away. She hated it, the mottled white skin, shining like the slick underbelly of a fish, dry and flaking where it was pressed with the texture of rough bandages. The once-soft hair of her arm had grown wiry and black where the linen chaffed it, and even when Nan forced her to leave off the bandages for a few hours to see how it went, even when the creases faded and the color returned, Betta thought her arm was an ugly thing. As often as she could, she tried to remember the bulging, uneven stump of that the Lossoth Chief had shown her; Betta's wrist was beautiful compared to his arm but still, she could not love it. She could not look at it without its bandages and seal-skin sleeve.

"Give it time," Nan said, putting away her ointment and taking up a clean bandage. Betta realized that there were tears on her cheeks and she wiped them away with her hand, glad that Fili was shut out where he could not see the damage that had been done to her.

"I still feel my fingers, sometimes," she told Nan. "When I close my eyes, I can move them. I…"

Nan laid a gentle hand on her elbow. "It is memory only," she said. She took a handkerchief from her pocket and gave it to Betta to dry her eyes. "In time, you will forget the feeling. It has been only a little while since you lost your hand, but you are healing well, far better than I would have guessed considering the state that you were in when we found you."

Betta smiled through her tears. "When _you_ found me?" she said. "When Fili sent me to you, you mean, and you were so rude to him."

"He was rude to me in my own home, and he leaves my daughter waiting for days." Nan wrapped up Betta's arm quickly and with a skilled hand, hiding the unwanted sight under many layers of clean, white linen. "Besides," she added with a smile, "I am older than he is, and it is my duty to chide the young, to remind them that they will not live forever."

Betta shivered.

"I do not mean you," Nan said quickly. "I need not remind _you_ that you will not…"

"But you do," Betta said. "I need reminding, if only to be sure that I do not waste these moments. I have had so little happiness."

Nan frowned. She glanced at her husband, but Gilon sat facing the fire, keeping his thoughts to himself. She leaned close to Betta. "There are tales told of Thror's line," she whispered, "dark stories that I heard long before I left the eastern mountains, before the dragon took Erebor."

"What tales?" Betta asked, but Nan shook her head. She would not say.

"Those were dark days in the east. Dark even within our own mountain. Frei would have gone to be with her sworn-husband, but after the war, there was little to keep us. I had seen enough suffering…" Nan looked hard at Betta, searching her eyes. "Are you certain that you love him, this proud Durin's son? You would follow him?"

"I cannot follow him on the journey that he has planned, if that is what you mean, but when he returns… yes, I will go where he goes, if he does not stay here. It is no hardship for me to live without a home. I love him, Nan. I will take care of him. I nearly died to save him."

"You nearly died to save his brother," Nan corrected her.

"No." Betta shook her head. She knew what she had told Fili and Kili, it was what she had told Nan her first night in the cabin, but it was only part of the truth. "I was not thinking of Kili when I gave myself to the river. I would have done it for him, I think, but…" She looked down at her arm now mercifully encased in the seal-skin sleeve, hidden from her sight. "Fili would not live long without his brother," she said. "I know that loss too well."

Nan was watching her closely, and Betta wondered how much the old dwarf-woman guessed about her relationship with Fili's brother. "I have had little certainty in my life, Nan," Betta said, clenching her left hand into a fist, and she felt her missing right hand tighten as well, "but one thing that I know to be true: I love Fili. He is the only man… the only Dwarf, that I… but if you will not have him in your home…"

"When he is with you, he is welcome," Nan said, putting away her things. "It is late, and I am tired. When your friend leaves, see him to the door and bolt it shut behind him. Do not go with him to the road; I do not like to think of you walking back alone at night. These hills are not as safe as they once were… if ever they were."

"I will only go as far as the door," Betta promised. She did not need to guess what danger Nan saw outside their cabin walls. It was not marauding orcs or human thieves that she feared, but the Man who slept in the barn. On any other night, Betta would have found it strange to think of Nan accepting Fili who she did not like into her home but still not trusting Tom. Tonight, Betta was only glad to know that Fili was inside, in her room, waiting for her to join him.

* * *

**I haven't decided if I want to write Betta and Fili's wedding night next, if I can restrain my desire for smut long enough to get past FF's rating system... not that anyone reads this thing anyway, right? ;)**

**By the way, I've recently (****belatedly) ****discovered Jenny Trout's chapter-by-chapter recap of the truly terrible 50 Shades of Grey books. Her take on them is hilarious and wonderful, and she gives a lot of great advice to aspiring authors on how to write a good story (and how to not write a bad one). You can find it on her blog, Trout Nation at jennytrout-dot-com, and I cannot recommend it highly enough!**

**-Paint**


	17. Fili's Wedding Night

**I've been waiting months to write this chapter, but I suppose that fair warning is due. The MPAA would give the following scene an R rating, but then, they'd give an R rating to what I would suggest the MPAA can do with their ratings system. If you're old enough to be reading on FF, then you're old enough for this, but of course...**

_**This chapter contains descriptions of brief nudity and sexual situations, reader discretion is advised.**_

* * *

Betta sat at the table, resting and watching while Nan put away the jars of ointment. It always took a few minutes for her arm to adjust to the tightness of fresh bandages. Nan insisted that the pressure would help her wounds heal, but it was still uncomfortable, and Betta begrudged the discomfort as yet another reminder that she was maimed and broken.

Gilon covered over the fire in the fireplace with ashes and Nan straightened up the room, putting everything back in its place for the night. Betta said goodnight to them both and Nan nodded to her once and gave her a stern look before she retired with her husband for the night. Betta knew what was meant by it.

The lamplight flickered through the gap under Nan and Gilon's door, and she could hear the gentle rumble of Gilon's voice through the wall. Between Betta's bedroom and theirs was built a narrow, thick-walled pantry full of bread baskets and apple barrels and bushel bags full of dried corn. She would not be able to hear them from her room, and they would not hear her.

Betta sat alone for a few minutes longer, thinking and shivering in the dark. Fili was waiting for her, and she felt guilty for asking him to wait. He would want to complain about Nan's behavior, of course, and then… But she did not know for certain why he had agreed to stay. She did not know whether he would want to spend the night. He might have waited long enough to arrange for their next meeting before he went back to the mountain and his own bed.

Unhappily, she sighed and stood up, shaking her skirts out around her ankles. She was anxious and did not know why. She was eager, and knew exactly why that would be.

Betta knocked once to warn Fili before she entered, but he had the door open quicker than she could pull back her hand. He stepped aside to let her through, and she kept her eyes on the floor as she passed by him. She was not ready to see his face and did not want him to know she had been crying. Her lamp was hanging on its hook; Gilon must have left it there. She went to it and turned down the flame, hoping that the shadows would hide her red-rimmed eyes when she turned back to him.

Fili closed the door. "I would not have believed it if I had not seen it," he laughed uncomfortably. "You are indeed Nan's daughter. I feared for my safety more than once in her presence."

"She is a good woman," Betta said. "A good dwarf-woman." She did not blame Nan for being suspicious, but she searched Fili's face in the dim light and remembered the dark tales of Thror's line that Nan had hinted at. She wondered what the stories were.

Fili was standing near the door, looking around the room curiously as if he had not spent fifteen long minutes alone in it already. He took care not to look at Betta's bed and kept well away from it, turning instead to the far wall and the large wooden chest pushed into the corner. He looked at the few small items that she had set out on the painted lid. There was her mother's mirror and comb, and there her father's metal box, the thing that had begun their quest and brought them to this moment. Fili took it up and turned it over in his hands.

"You do not have much here," he said. Apart from the bed, the chest and a small basin of embers that warmed her room, there were no other furnishings.

"I have as much as I need," Betta said. "I do now." He looked up and she smiled, but she saw that he was still very uncomfortable. "You do not need to stay," she told him. "Nan and Gilon have gone to bed for the night. If you leave now, you will not see them."

"You had something to say to me…"

"I did," she said. "I do. I did not want to let you go without knowing whether you would come back again." She looked down at the box in his hands. "If this is goodbye…?"

"It is _not_ goodbye," Fili said. He put down the box and stepped up to her, taking her hand in his. He did not need to lift her chin to look her in the eye. He needed only to look up. "I will see you again, Betta, everyday. Or, every night, I suppose it must be, if I am to slip in and out of the mountain without being seen. Night is best for that, but I would like to see you. I would like to see you in daylight, in starlight, and in…" His eyes turned unbidden toward the bed behind her, but he stopped himself and looked down at her hand instead.

"And I have this!" He took the key from his pocket and held it up. "A gift from my brother," he said, eagerly explaining the key's purpose and the secret of the hidden door.

Betta smiled as he spoke too quickly for her to follow what was said. She waited patiently until he ran out of words. "And so," she said, once he had fallen silent, "will you stay tonight, or must you go? It is late and the air is cold outside this room. Nan did not want me to go out, but if you must leave, then I will walk with you a little ways." She did not want to leave the cabin or the comfort of the thick quilts on her bed. The night was cold and even though her room was well-warmed by the iron bowl of embers that Gilon and Fili had filled, she felt a shiver trickle down her spine and a shudder run through her body.

Fili held her hand and felt it shaking. He frowned up at her. "Are you cold already? We will not go outside. It is warm in here."

She took her hand from his and thrust her cold fingers under her arm to warm them. "I had thought to leave the cold behind in the northern lands, but it seems to have followed me." She laughed nervously and shook her head.

"You should have a stove of your own in this room," Fili said. He turned toward the iron bowl and looked up into the corner of the ceiling where a hole would be cut to pass a stovepipe through. "It would not be very difficult to install one here."

"But stoves do not grown on trees," Betta said. "Gilon is building one for me, when he has time to spare from his paying work. It will be ready before the frost returns. Fili?"

He looked back at her, and she took a deep breath. "Fili, do you really wish to spend this whole night, our first night together after so long apart, talking about keys and doors and ironwork? If that is all you want, I will gladly contribute to whatever conversation you choose, but I…"

She hesitated but before she could doubt herself, she stepped forward and took his face in her hand. She bent her head to kiss him and he kissed her back, at first. He kissed her fervently until he stopped and pulled suddenly away. Betta stared at him, her eyes wide as she searched his face, her cheeks flushed red with shame.

"I am sorry," she said. She turned her back to hide her hurt from him. "I will not keep you. You must be wanted back in the mountain."

She moved to step away but before she could, she felt his arms wrap around her waist. He pulled her close and leaned against her. Without her heavy boots or his, he was several inches shorter than she, and he rested his chin upon her shoulder with a sigh.

"I leave it to you to choose, Betta," he said. "If you were a dwarf-woman, I would not dare to touch you even as much as I have, not without a formal agreement, which we can never have. Thorin will not allow it. We will have no ceremony nor any wedding feast." He turned her around to face him. "I need none of these things. I need only your word. Will you take me for your husband, Betta? I would have you for my wife, and I cannot rest until I know your answer, yes or no? Will you marry me without Thorin's blessing?"

"And if I say no?"

"Then I will stay or go as you please. I will play the part of a husband for you tonight, if that is what you want. I feel it in my heart, and I want you to be happy and to know that I love you."

Betta closed her eyes and leaned her forehead against his, relief and elation flowing through her until she was exhausted. "I know it, Fili," she whispered. She felt his lips brush against hers, and she smiled. "And my answer is yes. Yes, Fili, I will marry you." She opened her eyes and saw him staring at her in disbelief.

"I thought that you would want to wait."

She kissed him into silence and laid her hand upon his chest. He felt different without the heavy winter clothes between her skin and his, and she could feel his heart beating beneath her palm. She realized that she had not been this close to him, face to face and holding him, not since that night in the cavern after the avalanche when he had been naked and she…

"I want you, Fili," she said. "I need nothing else." Her hand pulled at the coat he wore until her right arm touched against his side and she winced. Gently, Fili held her elbow and eased her back a step.

"Let me." He took his hands off of her long enough to unfasten boot and belt and remove them, and to remove his coat and vest, until he stood before her clad only in his long, loose shirt and trousers. He had lost another inch to her height with the loss of his shoes.

With one shaking hand and her teeth, Betta had worked free the knots in the lacing that tied the fitted sleeves of her dress. She was still at work upon the strings that laced up her collar and bodice when Fili stopped and stood still, looking at her.

"I should say that I… I have not before…" He stammered and fell silent.

Her hand stilled. "Your first time?" she said softly. Her eyes were wide with surprise.

"My first time with you," he said. "My first time with a woman who was taller than I." He shrugged his shoulders and hoped that he had said enough.

She smiled and stepped up close to him until she could hook her finger into the pocket of his trousers. "Nan has told me that, even for the elves, all parts work the same," she said. "She says it is the same for animals and for all living things that walk within the circles of the world."

Fili laughed. Of course that old midwife would know what parts worked on who and in what way. "I do not care about the elves," he said. He kissed her, and his fingers pulled at the long string that hung down from the collar of her dress. "I do not care about Nan, either." Slowly, he worked at the knot that fastened the lacing of her bodice. "This is not your first time here," he said, without looking at her, but there was no judgment in his voice.

"No," she said, "it is not my first time." He had loosened the collar of her dress and slipped his hand under the cloth. His warm fingers curled about her neck while his thumb followed the smooth line of her collar bone and his wrist rested lightly against her left breast.

"How many?" he asked.

Betta looked at him, uncertainly. "Three," she said, and waited. If he were a Man of her own race, she knew, he would be running the numbers, wondering whether she meant three times with one man, or three men many times apiece. He would be thinking other things as well, thoughts that only a jealous man could conceive of. There were many who would abandon a woman for less, but Betta was not ashamed of the life that she had lived. She did not care what other men thought of her; she cared only what Fili would think. And that, she realized, was why she had been so afraid to enter this room with him.

Fili was silent for too long a while. His hand was still on her neck, his fingers curled absently over her shivering skin. He looked but seemed to see right through her.

"Am I a whore to you now, Fili?" she asked.

He shook himself from his thoughts and stared up at her in surprise. "What? No, never!" he said, and added quickly, "but if you did that work, still, I would love you. You need not tell me everything. You have your past, Betta, and I have mine, only I have never been here before." He unwound his fingers from the thread of her dress and stepped back until he could sit down on the edge of the bed.

Betta sat beside him, and he took her hand again. "Kili says that you are more than eighty years old," she said.

"Eighty-two," he told her, and she laughed.

"Why, you are an old man! I cannot believe that no woman has ever loved you in that time."

"It is not so uncommon among my race," he said. "It is true that some dwarves partner when they are very young. They will play at making house with another dwarf-lad or -lass, and sometimes such couplings lead to marriage. Sometimes not. Kili had a lass or two who would play with him when we were young, but I never did. I was too busy learning how to be a king, and Thorin had no wife."

"You did not learn your lessons very well. It is not kingly for you to be here with me."

"But it is," Fili said, turning to face her. "I love you, and I have promised to marry you. What king would go back on his word that way? But will you marry me, truly, knowing all that it means? Thorin will not praise the oath I swear, nor will any dwarf recognize you as my wife. Most of my folk will not even recognize _me_, once it has come to light… and there is so little that I can offer you. You have so much already, yet I would add to that a husband, too, and not just for one night. Forever."

Betta sat still and thoughtful for a long while, and Fili waited, patiently. Finally, she stood up and walked away from him. She went to the west-facing window and unfastened the latch. The coals in the basin had warmed the room, and he thought that she meant to let out some of the smoke, but she pushed back the pane and then turned to him. She held out her hand, and he came and stood beside her, not knowing what she meant to do.

"If you will have me, Fili, and all the trouble I will cause, then I will be your wife, and gladly. I have no home, no family to ask, but by the stars above and the trees that have warmed and sheltered me, I will be your wife."

Fili pressed her hand. "I would rather say these words before my uncle and my brother," he told her, "before all my kin within the mountain, but I need no other witness but you. By the mountains above and the stones beneath my feet, I am your husband, Betta."

He spoke with all seriousness due to the occasion, but after his oath was sworn, Betta laughed. She bent her face down to kiss him, and he put his arms around her.

"I have no rings to trade with you," she said. "All my gold is in coin as you well know."

He shook his head. "My folk do not trade rings," he said. "It is a secret why, but someday I will tell you. No, in our wedding ceremony, we bring beads and golden thread and braid them in each other's hair."

Betta reached up to touch her hair, but the bead that he had given her was not there. It was tucked away in a box in the chest across the room. "That was only a bead, I swear," Fili said, holding up his hands and laughing at her confusion. "A marriage bead is nothing without the oath that comes with it. Do you think that every ring ever worn by one of your race is a sign of marriage? I hope not! I have seen tall folk-women with five or six bands at a time wrapped about their fingers."

Betta was more than a little relieved to hear it. He had given her that bead long before there was any talk of marriage between them, but she combed her fingers through his hair and touched his braided beard. She sighed. "It is just as well. I could not weave a braid," she said, looking at her one hand sadly.

He kissed her fingers. "It is only a ceremony," he said. "It means less than the oaths that we have spoken here tonight. I am your husband."

"You are," she agreed, and looked at him with heat in her eyes, "and I insist that you stay the night, now, husband," she said. "After all, it is our wedding night."

He kissed the palm of her hand. "I will stay a few hours," he said. "But I must be back inside the mountain before dawn. I cannot be discovered missing or I may not be able to slip away again tomorrow night, and the night after that…"

She laughed and took back her hand, using it instead to pull at his shirt, but he stopped her and for the first time, she realized that he was afraid. "You know what to expect," he said, "but I am a dwarf and not a man… it may not be the same…"

"I will show you," Betta said. "It is the same. All parts are the same," she added, and he did not begrudge her the hint of amusement in her eyes. He enjoyed seeing her so pleased.

Fili stripped off the last of his clothes, and he helped her with her dress, taking care with the fitted sleeves so that they did not pull at the bandage on her arm. That, only, must stay in place. He helped her until she stood as naked as he, with only her arms to wrap around herself. She was not embarrassed, but she was cold and shivering. He urged her quickly into bed and under the covers. The basin of coals gave off enough heat to warm a closed room, but Betta had left the window open and he did not feel right to close it. Those mountains were witness to his oath, and the stars above.

Even under the blankets, Betta was shivering in his arms. He was concerned for her, but she shook her head. "I feel the cold more deeply than before," she said, and he did not need to ask, before what, "but I will not be cold for long. You are very warm." She pressed her body against his and threaded her fingers through the thick hair on his chest. It was too dark in the room for her to see him well, but she remembered that the hair on his body was as yellow as the hair on his head, and that there was much of it.

Fili ran his fingers over her smooth skin and kissed the space between her breasts. "You have less hair than a dwarf-woman," he said softly.

She laughed. "And you have more hair than any Man I have seen. We are even, then. Be careful!" She had lain on her left side, but his movements had caught her right arm between them again.

"I will be careful," he assured her, and he was. He guided her injured arm gently to one side so that it rested safe on the pillow next to her head. He left a trail of kisses down from her elbow to her shoulder, and then he lay between her legs, looking up at her. "You are certain that this is what you want?" he asked.

"I am," she said, "are you?"

"Yes. There is nothing else. Nothing but you and I alone in this room. I love you, Betta."

"I love you more."

He smiled, and she gasped. He kissed the smooth line of her jaw as he moved against her, and cupped her breast in his hand. She was warm now, and her skin seemed to glow in the mingling of the lamplight and the starlight that fell through the open window. The sweat of her skin shone like diamond dust, and it was a long while before either of them spoke again.

.

Fili woke up warm and content in a strange bed in a strange room. The air smelled strange, too, and he was not alone. Not since he was a small child and would wake to find that Kili had crept in under the blanket with him had he shared a bed with anyone. Of course, he had spent many nights asleep on the cold, hard ground, with Betta or Kili or any number of other dwarves pressed against his body for warmth, but here there was a soft mattress and many blankets covering him. He was naked, and his head lay upon Betta's naked shoulder. Her skin was warm against his cheek, and her arm was wrapped around him, holding him. He lay on her left side, and her bandaged right arm rested above the covers. In the dim light of the room, the sleek seal-skin sleeve appeared wet and glossy. He wondered what her arm looked like under it.

Fili lifted his eyes to Betta's face and was surprised to find her still awake. She did not look at him, though she must have felt him move. Her open eyes reflected back the silver moonlight from outside the open window.

Moonlight? He sat up suddenly. "Did I fall asleep? I must get back to the mountain before…"

"It is not late," Betta said, holding on to him. "You've rested less than half an hour, and you were only half asleep."

"It seemed longer than that," he said, letting her pull him down again. He lay beside her, looking up at her with is arms wrapped around her waist, and himself wrapped in the scent of her: sweat and grass and iron. "Have you been awake all this time?" he asked.

She smiled and did not answer. Her eyes were still on the far window. "You spoke in your sleep," she said.

"What did I say?"

She shrugged the shoulder that he was not leaning against. "I do not know. It was in the Dwarf speech, and I will not offend your ears trying to repeat it."

Fili wanted to lay with her until the sun rose over the hills, but he knew that the night was growing old and that he had to go soon. He sat up again and looked around the room. The lamp had gone out while he was asleep, and the faint glow of embers in the basin was not bright enough to reach the bed. The shadows would appear darker to Betta's unaccustomed eyes, and the air would be colder to her human skin. The night had crept in through the open window, and Fili saw goose pimples on Betta's neck and shoulders. When he had sat up, he had pulled the blankets away from her, revealing other signs that she was cold.

She did not seem to notice, but Fili drew the covers close around her again. "I cannot stay much longer," he said, kissing her cheek and breathing in the scent of her skin. "I would like to see you tomorrow."

"Tomorrow is today," she said absently. "What you said to Nan last night…"

"I should not have been rude to her. She has been kind to me, and I will never again speak against her in her own home, or anywhere else for that matter."

"I do not mean that," Betta said. "That is between you and Nan and not my business." Her brow pinched in deep thought, and she looked at him directly for the first time since he had woken. "I meant, what you said about Erebor."

He shook his head. "I did not speak of it."

"Not in so many words, but I heard what you did not say. And what you _did_ say was that there have been delays. All through our journey north, you told me that you would have to leave quickly and soon, as soon as you were home, but now there is some delay. What is it?"

Fili drew himself up and drew away from her. He pulled at the quilts, settling them close around her while he gathered his thoughts.

"The delay is that my uncle has hoped for too much," he said slowly. "Thorin wished for armies of dwarves to march behind him, to reclaim the mountain and dispatch the dragon. He summoned our kin from the Iron Hills and from the mountains beyond and hoped that they would answer his call as they answered Thrain after Thror was killed." He sighed. "That was the delay, waiting for our kin to come, but none have. Or, not many, only seven."

"Seven dwarves out of the expected thousands? Your uncle must be angry."

Fili shook his head. "No, but he is disappointed. Perhaps if Thrain had reached the mountain and been devoured by Smaug, they might have… After our last great war, many of my folk have lost their lust for battle, but Thorin is determined."

"You think that he will put off the journey to give your folk more time to prepare? You think that his friends will come to him next year?"

Fili's frown deepened. He knew that it was only his own wishful thinking that had given them a full year's respite. Thorin had said nothing about putting off the journey; he only considered now the less lofty goal of leading a smal company along the road to the Iron Hills. They would investigate the lands about the Lonely Mountain, as Fili himself had suggested, and journey such as that would need little preparation. There would be no delay.

"I do not know," he said to Betta. He did not want to think on it, on any of it, not now. He had her finally in his arms. He was in her bed, and he did not want to talk about how soon they would be separated by hundreds of leagues of wilderland.

"You cannot delay," she said firmly. She looked into his face, but he turned his eyes away, not wanting her to read the doubt that was written there.

"It is not my decision."

"But Thorin is your uncle. You influence him. You might counsel him not to wait so long…"

"I do not want to leave you."

Betta grew suddenly very still and she looked away. "That is the worst reason yet," she whispered. "I did not give up my quest for you, did I? And where would we be if I had?"

"You would have one hand more than you do now," he told her.

"And you would have your uncle's love instead of mine," she said angrily. "I do not believe that you would give up your honor to lie in bed all day with me. Will you let your uncle face the dragon alone? Will you say farewell to your brother while you stay here? Kili will not be held back. He knows better."

"I will not speak of this now," Fili said, turning away from her and climbing out of the bed. "The moon has risen and I must go." He went to the window and closed it, and then he dressed quickly in the cold air. Betta gathered a heavy quilt about her shoulders and stepped into her shoes.

"No, you stay here," he said. "Do not suffer the cold for my sake."

"I do not. I promised Nan that I would see you to the door and lock it shut behind you."

"She does not trust me." He laughed.

"She does not trust Tom," Betta told him. "You, she only does not like."

They made their way quietly across the front room to the door, and Betta offered once more to walk with him as far as the hill, but her words were a matter of course and he politely refused. The night was cold, the cabin was warm, and like Nan, he did not want her to walk alone.

"I will return to you this evening," he promised, pulling her into his arms, quilt and all. He kissed her mouth. He found her hand and kissed that, too. "I will visit you as often as I can, I promise. Will you wait for me?"

"I will be here," she said, holding tight to him until he was forced to pull away and slip out the door. She turned the latch and then hurried back to her room to stand at the window and watch him go. She watched until he turned the corner and disappeared behind the forge. The moon was half full, and he would have no trouble finding his way back up the mountain to the secret door. There were still a few hours left in the night for him to sleep in his own bed.

Betta lay down in her bed and she cried. She was doing a lot of that lately, and it seemed strange to her to be so sad when she had everything that she needed to make her happy. She would wait for Fili to come back tomorrow, but if he did not, well, it would not be the first time that he had broken a promise to her. And she did not think that it would be the last.

* * *

**LadyMedusaAshe: You are too, too kind to lavish so much unearned praise upon these poor stories of mine. Thank you :) I try to update as often as I can, but if my work is as well-written as so many of you say, it is because I do not skimp on the editing process. I spend many hours each week making sure that every post is of the highest quality before I put it up for my lovely readers.**

**Yours, always,**

**-Paint**


	18. Planting Season

In her dreams, she has her hand back, strong and uninjured, the hand that bent her bow and held her knife. The hand that killed a man once, two years ago in Dunland. Fili sits across from her at the dinner table while Nan serves the meal and Gilon eats.

"I am glad that you finally listened to me," Fili says, holding tight to her hand. "It was right to give up your quest and come home. We need no treasure from the north. I have you, and I will not let go." He smiles.

"I know it," Betta tells him as she picks up the ivory bone-saw from the table. "I know it," she says, and she begins to saw her right hand from her wrist. The teeth tear into flesh, the edge grinds against bone. Fili's eyes are as pale blue as the winter sky in the northern lands. He holds her hand and does not let go.

.

The room was still dark when Betta woke, but she could see the morning sun outside the north-facing window. Her western window would stay dark for many hours yet. She was alone.

She had slept with only the single quilt wrapped about her naked shoulders, and the embers in the basin had died during the night. Her hands and feet were numb with cold, but her right arm still hummed with the vibrations of the bone-saw. She would not have been awake for that. Elm would have made sure, but somehow, in the darkness, she remembered the feeling of bone grinding against bone, jarring through her, letting her know what she had lost. After more than a month, she still had to remind herself that the hand was gone.

Betta dressed quickly, pulling on the same clothes that she had worn the day before – her only clothes until the tailor finished his work. She laced up the right sleeve and knotted the string at her collar, but she had yet to figure out how to tight her left lacings with her teeth. It did not matter. Soon enough, she would have her new clothes, better clothes with buckles and button-hooks instead of lacing. It would be good to be able to dress herself again.

Betta left her room and found Nan by the fireplace, already stirring the shallow pan of hot porridge that would be breakfast for their small family. The dwarf-woman set aside her spoon and deftly laced up the last of Betta's dress. She unfastened the knot at Betta's collar and retied it into a bow.

"You did the milking already?" Betta said, seeing the pan on the table.

"Tom did it," Nan said. "I thought that you would sleep late this morning."

Betta nodded. She _had_ slept late, almost a whole hour longer than she usually did, but it was still early in the morning. "Fili said that he would return again tonight," she said.

Nan's face told what she thought of that, but she did not say it. She nodded. "I will not turn him away if he does," she said simply and went back to her pan.

Betta sat down at the table, her arm held in her lap. "He will not be rude to you again. I know that he will not be. He is too glad that you let him stay the night. I do not think that he expected it."

Nan gave a snort of contempt. "You are a grown woman, are you not? You have a mind of your own, do you not? And you use it. Why should I order you about? You are not one of those silly, simpering things from town, either." Still crouched down by the fire, Nan turned on her heels and looked over her shoulder at Betta. "There may be consequences, of course," she said, giving her a careful look.

Betta shook her head, but then she reconsidered. She shrugged her shoulders. "That has not been a possibility for me for a very long time," she said. "I am too old and have suffered too much. There is no softness left in me… my strength is not the sort to nourish a child."

Nan frowned at her. "Never say never," she said, "but maybe you are right in that. Fili has married very young for a dwarf lad, and you have married old for a woman of your race. Dwarves and humankind, we are, well, we are not as well-adapted as we seem." Nan sighed and turned back to her work. "Gilon and I were nearer in age when we met. We might have tried, but we did not."

Betta looked up from her thoughts. "Why did you not?" she asked, finding herself suddenly very interested in the answer. "It would have been difficult," she mused, "but you are outcast already. Your folk could not shun you any more than they do now."

"No, no more, but it is enough. I would not choose this life for a child. It would not be kind," Nan said, as if it were a simple choice, but Betta was not fooled.

"You wanted children," she said.

"I did," Nan agreed. "And if I had met Gilon back home among my own folk, perhaps… No, there is no perhaps about it. I would have done it. The Blacklocks do not encourage intermarriage between the other races, but they are not so stubborn as Durin's folk. They would not have turned us away. Indeed, there were so few dwarves in the east after the war… after…"

Betta waited, eagerly hoping that Nan would say more. She had hinted many times at a dark secret or struggle in her past, and Betta guessed that a deeper tragedy had struck the Orocarni after the Great War at Hithaeglir that Fili and Kili spoke of. Something had happened in the east before Nan and Frei set out westward, but Nan had never told that tale, and Betta did not feel right to ask. Adopted daughter or not, she had known Nan for only a few weeks and it was not her place to pry.

"Gilon has gone out to the fields," Nan said suddenly. "He thinks that the eastern acres are still manageable and would be the best home for your seeds. You will want to start the planting soon. Two of your saplings have already sprouted, over there by the window, but they are too small for me to say what they will be."

Betta looked toward the far wall. She had planted one of each kind of the heirloom seeds in its own pot and set them along the south wall where warmth inside the cabin would wake them early. She wanted to know what they were before she planted them.

At Nan's direction, Betta walked over to the long row of pots and looked down at the two tiny threads of white and green that pushed up through the moist, brown soil. They were too thick to be blades of grass, and too thin to be the usual broadleaf weed that grew wild in the fields. She frowned.

"They are two in the same pot," she said, surprised. "But I planted only one seed apiece."

By the fire, Nan shrugged. "One of them is a weed, then," she said. "Would you like to place a bet on which is which?" She looked up from her pan with a smile, and Betta was glad to see that the dwarf-woman's mood had brightened once more.

"They look the same to me," Betta said, leaning closer. "My bet is that that one seed has sent up two shoots."

Nan walked over to the pot and bent down to have a better look of her own. She shook her head. "I say the left is a weed," she said. She held out her hand, and Betta shook it to seal their bet. "Now," Nan said, "go and find my wayward husband for me. Breakfast is nearly ready, and he had better not be thinking of working in the forge today. That knee of his is acting up, and it is time for Tom to make himself useful."

* * *

**It's a short chapter this time because that's all I've been able to write for two weeks. I've had a series of chronic migraines which, when matched with my pre-migraine aura and post-migraine hangover, have allowed me only a few hours a day that my brain will tolerate looking at computer screens. Unfortunately, my paying job takes precedent.**

**Instead, we'll play Q&amp;A with my most commonly asked QtF question: How tall is Fili?**

**So, I've been really lazy and inconsistent with Dwarf vs. Human height in this story. Yeah, I know, and I hope to fix it someday in the rewrite. If anybody has a lot of time and patience and wants to be my editor, I'm taking volunteers, but until then, in this story, Fili is 4'9". He usually wears thick-soled boots made for walking on heavy stone all day long, and his princely posture makes him seem even taller compared to a footsore, wandering woman with no family name. Betta is 5'2" and her boots (before she wore them out in the Forodwaith) are thin soled so that most of the time she and Fili seem not much different in height. And, before you ask, Kili is 4'8".**

**Any other questions, keep 'em coming, and I hope that I'll have a proper chapter for you next week, if my head doesn't decide to explode.**

**Yours, still surviving,**

**-Paint**


	19. Progress

**Middle-earth, and all who dwell within it, belongs to Tolkien. I am grateful to him for growing this beautiful garden in which our imaginations can play. Please review!**

* * *

Fili was not in his bed when Kili woke the next morning, and he thought it was strange. The bedclothes were changed, and Kili felt sure that his brother must have returned quietly to their rooms for a few hours sleep before he rose again and slipped out. It would not have been the first time that Fili had woken before his brother and gone down early to the mines for his work, but Kili could not help but feel that this time it was personal. He had gone through a great deal of trouble to reunite Fili with his dearest, but Fili had not waited even long enough to give him a wink and a nod to let him know whether that reunion had gone well.

Had it gone well? Kili thought suddenly, stopping in the middle of splashing water over his face and hands. They might have fought. Certainly, they had fought often enough upon the journey north, and last night Kili had not been there to separate them or to soften the sharp words they might say to each other. Was that the reason why Fili was avoiding his brother today? After all, Kili _had_ put them together.

The thought made him uneasy, especially after it was closely followed by the thought of what it was Betta and Fili might have argued about. He shook his head and pushed his worries aside as he finished dressing for the day. No, he refused to believe it. The worst that could have happened was that, after an evening of quiet conversation – or a night of loud passion – they had agreed that the gulf between woman and dwarf was too great to overleap. The differences between their races, Fili's familial objections and Betta's poverty… it was all too much for them. Last night, they had said their final farewells, parted as friends, and today Fili was grieving his loss.

Kili sighed and shrugged his shoulders. The truth was, he did not know and would not know until he met up with his brother. There was an itch between his shoulder blades that reminded him he had neglected his weapons training yesterday. Undoubtedly, that was the cause of these uncomfortable thoughts: his restless muscles were eager for action. He was determined to think so.

There was chores and work to do, but first he would go down to the training hall. After the morning meal he would wrestle away any lingering fears and sweat out all the doubts that still clung to his skin, doubts about his brother and Betta, doubts about himself. Only after all that, only after the day was old and dull, would he go looking for Fili and ask what happened last night. Fili could not hide all day. He must sometime show his face.

.

The few free hours that he had that day, Kili spent in the training hall with his sword, sharpening his talent against Gimli and the handful of other, younger dwarves who happened to be hanging about. Fror was off somewhere, being busy. If the old dwarf had been there to see him, he would have reminded Kili that it was his knife skills that needed work, not his swordsmanship. Kili already knew that, but it made him feel strong to do well at something that he could do well; he relished the praise of the younger dwarves. His confidence needed more strength today than his arm.

By midday, he was sweating hard and sore. He ate heartily at the noon meal and hid his disappointment that Fili was not there. The afternoon took Kili and his sweat-drenched clothes down into the cavern where Fror waited for him, a counting book under one arm and a wagonload of tools at the end of his pointing finger. The tools needed to be driven down to Thran's shop in town. Kili took his time driving down, but he did his gossiping inside the shop and drove the wagon home quickly. He did not dare risk running into Betta and speaking to her before he heard his brother's side of the story.

There was more than enough work to keep Kili busy all afternoon. Fror had a long list of orders waiting for him, things to carry and things to stack up, all grunt work that for once he did not mind doing. It prevented him from thinking too hard on questions that he could not answer. By the end of the day, he was worn out and feeling spry. He had forgotten all about his former fears as he hurried up the stairs to his room to wash up and change clothes for supper. Other dwarves might not mind carrying the stink of their day's labor into the dining hall, but Kili had learned to limit the many things that his cousins could tease him about. He would rather be taunted for smelling too sweat than for stinking of hay bales and horse droppings.

Kili threw open the door to his room and stopped short on the threshold with a cry of surprise. "Fili! Here already?" he said, laughing with relief.

Indeed, it was Fili sitting on the edge of his own bed, his clothes stained with the black dust of the coalmines. He rested with his elbows on his knees and his face looking down into his clasped hands, his expression thoughtful, but he did not look up or give any sign that he heard Kili's question.

Kili did not care. He ignored his brother's seeming indifference, too glad to finally have Fili under his thumb. "I have been wanting to speak to you, brother. Where have you been?" he demanded. "I half imagined that you might never have returned from the farm."

"No, I have not been to the farm today," Fili said, with a distracted shake of his head. "At least, not unless you count the very early hours when I slipped in before the sun rose. I returned home in darkness and in darkness I have labored all through the day. I have been down in the mines."

"What, _all_ day?" Kili echoed. Fili seldom spent more than half the day in the mines, and the other half at other chores or working on Betta's pendant.

Fili sighed. "There was a cracked bracing that needed mending, the grindstone had worn smooth and then one of the cross beams went out askew on the treadle…" he sighed again and shook his head. "What was it you wanted? Why were you looking for me?"

"No reason," Kili said, sensing his brother's reluctant mood. "You were late getting back last night and you left early. I wondered how the evening went. Not well?"

"Why would you think so?"

His brother's expression was unreadable, and Kili hesitated. "No reason," he said. "Well, why would I not? I have heard nothing from you. You have avoided me. I thought you might have some cause to be angry with me."

"No cause that I know of, brother," Fili said, finally looking up. His expression was stern, but there was no anger in his eyes. "I am not angry with you. Should I be?" he asked, and there was the familiar, playful twinkle. Kili felt shoulders relax and the tension that he had held all day was released.

"No," Kili said. "I helped you to reunite with Betta, and I thought that I would be blamed if the two of you ended your meeting with a fight."

"We did fight," Fili admitted readily enough, "but it was not over you. No, I brought this argument on myself, and it is she who I have been angry with, not you."

"What was your argument?" Kili asked, sitting on his own bed across from his brother. He was surprised to see a glint of gold resting on Fili's palm. He was holding Betta's pendant, the chain braided through his smudged fingers.

"We had a good night," Fili said, "a very good night. Better than I had any right to expect, but afterwards…" He frowned. "She spoke of Erebor. She seemed so impatient for me to leave. She still wants us to go…"

"I thought that _you_ wanted to go," Kili said, confused. "Have you changed your mind, then? You will not follow Thorin?"

"I will. I am determined!" Fili said, clenching his fist tight, and then releasing it slowly. "I am, but it was not what I wanted to think of just then. You would not understand." He knelt down and slipped the pendant under his bed, tucking it back into its hiding place.

"You should give that to her," Kili said, nodding to the pendant as his brother stood up.

"It is not finished," Fili said. "I have not decided what to put in it." He looked down at his hands and laughed uncomfortably. "Look at me! I must wash up again. What will she think of me, coming to her with hands as black as an Ironfist's?" He took a handkerchief from his pocket and tried unsuccessfully to wipe the coal dust from his hands.

"You will have plenty of time to wash up _after_ supper," Kili said. "Betta will still be there after you have eaten, but Thorin will not wait. He was concerned after you left so early last night. What will he say if you do not show your face at all tonight?"

"You must make my excuses for me, brother," Fili said, throwing down the cloth. "The mountain streams are cold but clean enough for me. I will wash up outside. I cannot wait a moment longer. I have spent all day regretting my mistake, and now I must make up for it. I must apologize for my sharp words and explain to her… She will think me cruel…" He shook his head and turned to go.

"I cannot keep lying for you, Fili," Kili said.

Fili stopped at the door and looked back. "No, you cannot," he agreed, "and you will not have to, not after tonight. Just this once more only, Kili, I promise, and tomorrow I will sit down with our uncle for all three meals and as many drinks in between as he – or you – demand. But tonight, I must go. I have waited too long already. What if she thinks that I will not come back?"

"Were you really so sharp with her?"

Fili shrugged his shoulders. "How angry did you think I was with you? And we were only apart for a day. I avoided Betta for two weeks and after our first night together, I hurried away from her in anger. You know her well. What do you think she thinks of me?"

Kili looked away, but he said, "Alright. This one time more I will cover for you, brother, only because you have covered for me more times than I can count when I was foolish. This will pay off my debt, but you must promise to wake me when you get in. I hate to be left wondering."

"I promise, Kili. Thank you!" Fili bowed low to the ground and laughed as he stood up again. "Eat well. Good night, and thank you, brother!" With that, he was out the door and down the passage before Kili could change his mind.

"Good luck," Kili muttered to an empty room. If this was love, then he was glad that he had not caught it. Fili would have to pay sooner or later for his pleasant times. Thorin would be no less angry the longer it took for him to find out what was being done behind his back.

Still shaking his head at his foolish brother, Kili changed his clothes and brushed the day's dirt from his beard. He turned his thoughts to the coming feast, but only a few minutes after his brother had left, he was started to hear a loud voice call out behind him.

"There you are, cousin!"

Kili turned and remembered that Fili had left the door open. Gimli was grinning at him from the passageway, laughing at his cousin's shocked expression. "You thought that you had beaten me so well this morning that I would not yet be back on me feet?" he laughed, shaking a finger at his cousin. "You were wrong. I am strong willed, and strong-armed!"

Kili grinned back at his favorite cousin, but he wondered whether Gimli would be in so laughing a mood if he had arrived a few minutes earlier and heard Fili and Kilis argument.

"If you meant to challenge me to another competition, cousin, then I am afraid you must wait for tomorrow," Kili said, searching for any sign of the eavesdropper in Gimli's eyes. He found none. "I have put down my sword for the day and am on my way to supper."

Gimli held up his hands. "No challenge," he said. "I am going down as well. May I walk with you?"

Kili easily agreed to that. He finished his washing up and cast one last look around at the hidden place beneath his brother's bed. He thought of the golden pendant and its hidden place, then stepped out into the passageway and shut the door behind him.

Gimli hooked his arm through his cousin's and they started down toward the dining hall. "You fought well this morning," Gimli said, "and with more energy than I would have expected from you so early in the day. Has old Fror been needling at you again that you were so eager?"

Kili shook his head. "He did not get in his jabs until the afternoon," he said, "but I am used to him by now, and his needles."

Gimli nodded. "Well, you have been a formidable opponent in recent days, with or without Fror provoking you. You strengthened your arm in the north countries, I think."

"One cannot help but do so up there," Kili said. He knew most of the stories that were whispered around the mountain, and he knew that only a little had been said about Betta and her role in their adventures. Gloin was strict with what his son heard and was told, and it was a reckless dwarf indeed who crossed that sharp-eyed merchant.

Kili did not like to guard his tongue, not from his uncle, and especially not from his cousin who should be next only to his brother as his closest confidant. Never before had Kili had so many words to watch, but then, before, he and Gimli's conversation had seldom strayed far from the topics of wagon trails and pub gossip. They hadn't had any secrets worth keeping.

Gimli cleared his throat and Kili realized that he had let the silence hang too long. "I am sorry, cousin," he said quickly. "I am unaccountably thoughtful today. Forgive me?"

"You, thoughtful! I am too astonished to be offended," Gimli laughed. "But you have been too quiet and too serious ever since your return from the northlands, Kili. My father says that it is because you have finally grown up." He grinned, and even Kili had to smile at the thought of it. Gloin had no idea how Kili had grown. The older dwarf's thoughts were all of gold and trade; he could not begin to guess what thoughts were in Kili's head.

"It must happen to the best of us," he said, "perhaps one day even to you, cousin."

Gimli put his hand to his heart and affected a look of despair. "I swear, I never shall!" he cried, and they laughed together until Gimli sighed and was serious again. "But here ends our fun," he said, wiping a mirthful tear from his eye. "I am afraid that I must deliver bad news to you, Kili. My father is sending Dern and his brother, Dweren, south with a few wagonloads of ore and sulfur. He has spoken to me this afternoon and told me that I am to go with them."

"What, go now?" Kili said, looking at him in surprise. "Surely Gloin will not leave us, not when Thorin is yet undecided?"

"No," Gimli agreed, "Gloin is not, but Gimli is. My father says that he is sending me south on an errand of my own, to buy and sell with my own skill. He says that I must learn the business, and that it cannot be done while I am dogging at his heels. _I_ think that he only wants me out of the way until you all have set out. You know that he has heard I have been asking Fili and others to speak for me to Thorin?"

"I did not tell him, and Fili would not."

"I know, but you know how my father can be," Gimli said, shaking his head. "If I am leagues away, riding south on a wagon, I cannot interfere. My mother is convinced that I have plans to hide away in a sack of feed and stow myself on Thorin's wagon train. She is half convinced that you and Fili would help me to do it."

"Ha! Well, that would be a good plan if there are wagons and horses enough to hide you amongst them, but I would not risk your mother's wrath, not even for you, cousin."

"It is just as well," Gimli said, not really as disappointed as he pretended to be. "The south is good enough for me. I like to travel, and though there are no dragons to slay this side of Hithaeglir, Dweren says that he has heard of orcs scavenging among the trees of Minhiriath. I might see some action along the road just the same." He smiled eagerly.

"Then I must make doubly sure that I do not take it easy on you in the training hall," Kili said, throwing an arm around his cousin's shoulders and striking a playful blow against his chest. "You will need all the practice that you can get if you are to battle orc-filth in the wild lands!"

.

Kili was in good spirits by the time they reached the Great Hall, his conversation with his brother forgotten up until the moment that he saw Thorin. He hesitated on the threshold, but Gimli had his arm and pulled him inside. They found an empty place on the long bench two dwarves down from Thorin's seat at the head of the table and Kili was engulfed in the noise of cousin, kin and friend. There would be no private council tonight, no quiet meal with only a handful of close conspirators.

Two dozen dwarves lined either side of the long table. The fire was roaring on the hearth and many hands passed up and down heaping platters of meat cut from the pig that had roasted upon its flames, as well as large bowls of boiled root vegetables. Smaller plates of leafy greens sat here and there upon the table; practically untouched, they added color to the silverware and stone dishes. This gathering was too boisterous for fine goblets.

Kili called out his greetings up and down the table, and answered those greetings that were shouted back at him. Oin sat across from him, and Dwalin was there, too, with his brother. They were seated up close to Thorin, of course. Dern and Dweren sat at the other end of the table, talking close with Gloin, and Gimli was watching them with a careful eye though he laughed and talked as cheerfully as ever.

Kili heaped his plate high and filled his mug. He strained his ears to pick up all the news being spoken around him while fist-sized rolls of bread, mottled with seeds and heavy grain, flew past his ears as just as quickly, aimed at any who asked – and at many who did not. Kili immersed himself in the familiar noise. The only thing missing was his brother.

It was not long before the meat was polished off and nearly all the drink drunk down to the dregs. After almost two hours of feasting, the fuller dwarves began to excuse themselves, heading off to their private rooms where their sturdy beds waited for them. Kili began to believe that he would escape without interrogation. Perhaps in all the commotion, Thorin had not noticed that one of his nephews was missing.

And then Kili heard his uncle's booming voice call out to him. "Kili! Lad, are you asleep at your plate? I said, hand me down that pitcher, Kili!"

The nephew called for had been listening too intently to Thrin's account of the southern branch of the Ered Luin, and he looked around to find a still half-full pitcher of ale resting at his elbow. He passed it up to Thorin. "Sorry, uncle," he said. "I was distracted."

"I guessed as much," Thorin answered, filling his mug. "It seems to be your common state these past few days, but I think I know what distracts you." He smiled, and Kili began to grown anxious. "Where is your brother?" Thorin asked, not helping Kili's anxiety at all, especially when he added, "I have not seen Fili at all today."

Though he should have expected the question, Kili found himself at a loss what to say. "Fili is, ah… He is…" he stammered, searching for an excuse.

"He is where he can always be found, down in the mines," Dern called from farther down the table. "I was checking the coal stock this afternoon and saw him there, in the thick of it with the colliers. That lad works as hard as ten stone-breakers, crawling through those tunnels."

"Aye, that he does," Dwalin agreed, with more respect than Dern had shown. "He is a credit to his kin," Dwalin added, raising a glass to Thorin and tossing a nod toward Kili as well. "Though, perhaps, he works too hard."

"Fili did say something about a cracked brace or a skewered treadle, something of that sort," Kili said. "He has been looking into it."

"He looks out for every detail," Thorin said, nodding. "I would expect no less of him. He is a good lad, but you are right, Dwalin, and he works too hard. He went so early to his bed last night that I hardly spoke a word to him, and he is not here today." Thorin frowned thoughtfully. "I had hoped that when I lessened his chores, he would have more time to take his ease, but is he spending all that free time down in the mines again?"

Kili realized that his uncle was speaking to him again, and that the hall was now emptied of more than half its former occupants. "I do not know how he spends _all_ his time," Kili said, carefully. "He has been down in the mines more than usual ever since we returned from the…"

"I only hope that he is not wearing himself out down there," Thorin said, interrupting his nephew before he could say more.

"I do not think that he is," Kili answered honestly.

Thorin frowned and looked hard at his nephew. It was Dwalin who broke the silence finally. "Well, when you next see your brother, Kili, you must tell him that we have missed him here in this hall. We need someone about to counter Gloin's grumpy moods and stop all this talk of trade!"

The dwarves all laughed, and Thorin joined in. Gloin harrumphed good-naturedly and winked at his cousin, but Kili thought that he saw a sharpness hidden in Gimli's father's eyes that belied his supposed good humor.

Kili pushed the last of his food around his plate for a few minutes longer before he excused himself from the table. He was dead tired and as eager for sleep as the dozen dwarves who had already gone to their rest. Bowing to his uncle, and swearing to Gimli that he would meet him again in the training hall the next day, Kili left the Great Hall.

Outside in the passageway, he heard the echo of footsteps and the voices of other dwarves retiring for the evening. Through the door behind him, he heard Dweren's ringing laughter. It was a comforting sound, and Kili turned toward the upper stairs, but before he could go he felt a heavy hand on his shoulder. He had not heard his uncle leave the hall after him. He was surprised that Thorin would come after him so quickly, but glad that he had not sought him out in his rooms. Kili would not need to once again explain Fili's absence.

"You are very jumpy this evening, Kili," Thorin said with very fatherly concern. "Have you not been sleeping well? I hope that Fili's long hours are not keeping you awake."

"No," Kili said. "In truth, I have hardly seen my brother these past few days. I worry about him."

"Fili keeps his own counsel," Thorin agreed. "I have not seem much of him, either. He is determined to keep away from me to spite me. I lessened his chores, but perhaps I was too hard on him at first. He is angry with me."

"No, uncle! Fili is only distracted, as I am distracted. We are thinking of Erebor, that is all." It was not all, but Kili was not about to admit that. It would do good to no one to remind Thorin of Betta.

Thorin smiled, and there was a sly look in his eye. "Well, if that is all," he said. "I would rather have told this to both of you at one time, but perhaps you might carry this news to Fili and he will think more kindly of me after…"

The door to the Great Hall opened, and two dwarves stepped out, Dern with Gimli under his arm. Thorin nodded to them and waited for them to move on, then he gestured for Kili to join him in a small alcove where they would not be overheard. He spoke on in a quiet voice, "Your brother will be glad to hear that I have taken his counsel to heart. Tell this to no other dwarf," Thorin said firmly, "but I am taking down names for a new company. I plan to lead no less than thirty dwarves in three wagons east to the Greenway and then down south to the Gap. We will go as far as the Anduin along the old trade roads of the White Mountains, and then we will cross the river near the Greenwood and approach the Long Lake from the south, creeping up as close to Dale as we can get without being seen…"

"You cannot mean to attempt the mountain with only thirty dwarves!" Kili said, amazed.

"I do, and I do not," Thorin answered. "As your brother has rightly pointed out, we are in no position to take on the dragon, not without Dain's help. No, the dwarves of this mountain will continue their preparations for war, gathering arms and strength. They will follow after us, but before they are ready, I mean to approach Erebor and scout out the lands, to determine the best means of attack before we go on to our final goal… the Iron Hills. This is an errand that I will not trust to any messenger but myself. I mean to speak with my cousin, to convince Dain to give me the aid that I need."

"If the Iron Hills are your goal, why not take the northern road?" Kili asked without thinking.

Thorin shook his head. "You know that answer. It was your own adventure there that cautioned me. The orcs are growing too great in number near to Gundabad, and it has been a long while since our folk went that way. Besides, because I intend to proceed my army, I must go in secret with my company disguised as a merchant caravan. There is no reason for merchants to go north, east of the coast."

Kili nodded. It was true enough, and even Gloin had only gone north to trade with the Lossoth tribes near to Forochel. He would not have gone more than a league east of the shore.

"So," Thorin said, smiling. "Will you come with me, Kili, to the Iron Hills? I think that with both my nephews behind me, we will win our cousin over."

Kili stared at him. "You do not mean… Then you _will_ take us with you? Fili and I are to go east with you, indeed?"

"Yes, indeed you will," Thorin said. "This is your quest as much as it is mine, and Erebor is your home, Kili, even if you have not seen it yet. I have been cruel to keep you and your brother in suspense. If you are willing, then you will go."

Kili laughed out loud and threw his arms about his uncle's neck. "Thank you, uncle! Thank you! Yes, we will go! I will go, and I will vouchsafe that Fili will be twice as eager as I am, but you did not need to ask, Thorin. You know that we both would follow you to the far eastern shores if that was where your road led."

Thorin laughed. "We need not go so far as that just yet. No, I did not need to ask, but I must have you willing, Kili. I want every dwarf who follows my road to be willing. It is a dangerous journey to a dubious end."

"When do we set out?"

"No later than June of this year," Thorin said. "Tharkun is due back by the end of next week, so Balin says, and Balin also says that we must wait for him. It is little trouble to me. We cannot be ready before that time, but once I have Dain on my side, I will have no more need of any wizard. We will turn our vengeance upon the mountain, and Smaug will feel the wrath of the Dwarves!"

"Dain will want gold, of course," Thorin added carelessly, stepping back out into the passageway, "but that is Gloin's business, not mine. Think of it, Kili: your first sight of The Mountain! On that day, I will be proud." He clapped his hand on his nephew's shoulder. "You may tell your brother all of this, but no one else. Balin and his brother, Gloin and his, those four only know what I have planned, no one else, not yet. And tell Fili that I no longer want him down in the mines. Let him sleep well tonight, for tomorrow, he must join you in the training hall. There is no knowing what dangers we may face in the east, and we must all be prepared."

"Yes, uncle!" Kili said, standing tall and proud.

Thorin squeezed his nephew's shoulder and bid him good night, then he went back into the Great Hall to rejoin the few dwarves who were still at their meal. The heavy door slammed shut, but its noise could not be louder than the pounding of Kili's excited heart. He could not wait to share the good news with Fili after he returned from the farm. It was good that Betta was determined to see them off on their own quest. She had always said that they should join their uncle going east to Erebor and now, it seemed, they would.

* * *

**You know the drill. If you like what you read (or just want to take pity on a poor, desperate fic writer), leave a review! Prove that the system works.**

**-Paint**


	20. Women's work

**Middle-earth, and all who dwell within it, belongs to Tolkien. I am grateful to him for growing this beautiful garden in which our imaginations can play. Please review!**

* * *

Fili took leave of his brother and hurried out of the mountain. His heavy boots echoed through the tunnels, but he did not care. All day, he had kept himself busy – just as Kili had – to avoid thinking of what he had done, but he could not forget or pretend that he had not spent the last two weeks denying Betta's presence in his heart and refusing to hear her name spoken. It was only thanks to Kili that she had still waited for him, and Fili knew it, but he did not know whether she would stay if she thought he had abandoned her again. Her thoughts were impenetrable to him, harder to gauge than stone. She might trust him to return, or she might expect him to vanish like a teasing rain-cloud on a sweltering summer's day.

But that was foolishness, he chided himself as he stopped at the first stream outside the mountain and splashed his dirty hands and fevered forehead with cold water. His clothes were clean enough, but his conscience was stained. Precious days had been lost already; Kili had been right about that, and Thorin's quest still lay before them, the only chance he had to prove his courage and his honor before he was disowned. Betta was right, too: Fili _must_ go to Erebor. And he must return to her to prove he held a different sort of honor.

The sun had sunk well below the horizon, and the sky was dark long before Fili reached the bottom of the hill. He hopped an ancient fence and started across the overgrown fields toward the distant light of the cabin. It had been many years since Gilon's family had tilled this earth; four hands were not enough to tame it, even if Nan had been inclined to farm, and she was not. Fili cursed the long, knotted grass and uneven turf, but eventually he reached the yard.

He passed by the barn, noting the single light in the upper window where Tom made his makeshift home, but there was no pale face looking out at him. He reached the cabin. There were lights in those windows, too, but they were dim, blocked out by closed curtains. Fili knocked his fist firmly against the front door before he remembered that he must be polite to the dwarf-woman, Betta's warden, inside.

He knocked again, more gently this time. The inmates were at home, but it was several minutes before he heard the latch turn and the door was opened and it was Gilon, not Nan, who stood upon the threshold frowning down at him. Gilon looked up, over Fili's head, and looked around the empty yard. He looked down again at the uncertain dwarf.

"I was expected…?" Fili said, wondering if he had been. He swallowed his injured pride and the urge to return the man's unhappy frown.

"Maybe you were," Gilon said slowly – and reluctantly, Fili thought – but he stepped aside and let the dwarf prince enter the cabin. "Expected guest are too often, unfortunately, forgotten when unexpected guests arrive," he added, closing the door.

Fili looked around the empty front room and wondered what that riddle meant. How many unexpected guests could visit this cabin? He saw a large, steaming pot atop the small stove. The door to Betta's room was closed, but a light shown under it. The fire in the fireplace had burned down to almost nothing, and the room felt colder than the warm spring night outside.

Gilon saw Fili's look-around and nodded to the closed door. "My wife is at work," he said. "Yours is with her, learning the trade." As if he thought that Fili would walk up and bang his fist on that door, too, Gilon put his arm around his shoulders and drew him toward the fire. "Have a pipe with me, master dwarf. It will help us pass the time."

Fili allowed himself to be led. He was confused, and not just by how easily Gilon seemed to acknowledge Betta's new marriage. The Man was in a strange and gloomy mood. He brought out his tobacco pouch and Fili took possession of the spare pipe once again. Gilon sank into a chair, and Fili took the other; it was built shorter and, he knew, must belong to Nan.

After a long, silent moment, Gilon stood up and threw a pair of logs onto the fire. He poked at the embers until the flames took their meal. There was more heat, but no increase in cheer, and it did little to lighten the mood of the room. Gilon sat down again and stretched his long legs out before him. Fili watched him in silence, straining his ears to catch the faint murmur of voices behind the bedroom door. He knew what Nan did for a living and thought to himself that surely the birth of any child, tall or short, must be louder than that.

"Do all Nan's women come unexpectedly to your home?" he asked.

"Some do, and some do not," Gilon said, in a voice that did not encourage conversation.

Fili sank deeper into his chair and was glad for the pipe that gave him something to do with his too-many hands. The silence was thick, and he cleared his throat. "That seems very… inconvenient," he muttered.

"Does it?" Gilon asked, loud enough to make Fili jump. "You made the journey easily enough." A thick cloud of smoke had already gathered around the Man's shoulders, and Fili imagined that Gilon had been sitting alone with his thoughts for a long time before Fili's knock had summoned him to the door.

"I only meant that it is a long walk from town," Fili pressed on, "and a high climb over the hill to reach your cabin."

"Yes, it is," Gilon agreed, and said nothing else.

Fili sighed and gave up talking. He tried to remember whether Gilon had been spoken much the last time they met, but if he had been as silent, then Fili had not noticed it. Betta and Nan had been there to fill in the gaps.

Gilon's dark mood was catching, and Fili began to wonder whether he had been wrong to assume that this Man and his wife would celebrate his marriage to their adopted daughter. Certainly Nan did not like him much. Or, perhaps, Betta _was_ angry with him and had tasked Gilon with keeping her husband at bay. Was she and Nan waiting in that closed room for him to leave?

Fili chewed the nub of his borrowed pipe, wondering whether he should give up and go home. He watched the smoke spiral up to the ceiling and gather itself among the rafters. Eventually, he stood up and bowed to Gilon as politely as he could manage. "You want your own company tonight, I suspect. I will wait for Betta in the yard. I will wait for an hour, and if she does not wish to see me…"

As he turned to go, Gilon seemed to wake suddenly from his thoughts. He sat up and shook himself free of the smoky cloud that had enveloped him. "What? Not wish to see you?" he said. "Of course she wishes to see you, but you cannot go in there. That is Nan's business, and we do not talk about it. Or, I should say, she and I do not talk about it to others. Those that come here do not care for their business to be much talked about, you understand."

It finally occurred to Fili that he had shown the same poor behavior that he had rebuked Nan for just last night. He was prying into business that was not his own. "I am sorry," he said. "I should not have questioned you."

"You would have had an earful from my Nan if you had questioned _her_, but I forget how little your menfolk know about women." Gilon gestured for Fili to sit down again. "You have so few of your own."

"I know enough," Fili said, feeling defensive of his race. "Our women are much the same as our men, strong and determined. Nan should have taught you that. They seldom fight in our wars, if that is the difference that you mean. Not that your womenfolk fight, either, but a dwarf-woman's duty is to fight first for her children, and…"

Gilon's face was grim, and Fili recalled that Nan had no children of her own. "Ignore my words," he said quickly. "It is late, and I am tired. My temper gets the best of me."

Gilon waved away his words. It was not forgiveness, but it was not anger, either. "However tired you may be, I do not advise you to speak to my wife that way. Do not speak to her at all, and do not question her regarding her work. Women have their own realms to rule, and it is best that we keep well out of them."

Fili nodded. He did not understand much of what Gilon said, but he was determined to say as little to Nan as he could get away with. He was only waiting for Betta; the night was warm, and he decided that he would take her outside to walk under the stars that she loved so much. There, he might speak his apologies without being overheard, and she would be in a better mood to forgive him.

The thick blanket of silence fell over them again. Fili's pipe burned low, but he did not ask for more leaf. Gilon seemed to have sunk back into his thoughts, and he once more began looking toward the front door, wondering if he would not be better off outside.

"You think that I am being a bad host, master dwarf," Gilon said, startling him, "but you come at a very bad time for me. If it were not for my wife's guest, you would not have seen me at all tonight."

"I did not mean to intrude…"

"No? But every word is an intrusion, every thought is painful to me tonight. I would rather spend this evening in my forge with the noise of the hammer to drown out all feeling, but I am too old for that now. These knees are no longer strong enough to stand on late nights. I had a sister once. I do not think you knew that."

"I did not know." Fili kept his eyes on the fire. He had only investigated enough to know that Gilon had no brothers and had assumed that the man was the only child of his parents. He had discovered that once that child was gone, the dwarves of Ered Luin would have their pick of the market; they would be the only blacksmiths for fifty miles around this side of the mountain. Now that he knew the man, Fili was ashamed to have planned for his death so callously.

"Her name was Saira. She died this night many years ago. Thirty years or more… It is strange, but the number of years slips my memory. Yet the day, this day, I cannot forget."

"I am sorry for your loss," Fili said, and hoped that it was the correct expression among the tall folk.

"More sorry than you would be if you had learned that I lost a brother," Gilon said. Fili felt his cheeks flush hot with shame, but Gilon was not bitter. "Now, if you were the sort of dwarf who pried into another man's business, you would ask me: how did she die?"

Fili hoped that the man did not really expect him to ask. He willed Betta into the room, to rescue him from this conversation. When _she_ spoke of things that he was not comfortable with and did not understand, at least he knew how to answer her.

"My sister died in childbirth," Gilon said.

Fili stared at him in open-mouthed surprise. Dwarf-women never died in childbirth. It was not possible. Only once had he even heard of a dwarf-woman losing her child after her belly had swollen, and that was due to a terrible accident. The wife of one of his miners, nearly fifty years ago, had been at work upon a high trellis, cleaning the carvings upon an archway, when a board had broken under her and dropped her forty feet to the stone floor below. The woman's back had been broken so that her body could no longer support the weight of a growing child, and it had been her choice to give it up. Once the burden was removed, the healers had been able to save the woman's life, and she had gone on to bear two daughters and a son in the years to come. Fili recalled that the lost infant had been given a little tomb of its own in the family vault, but no dwarf-woman had ever died in childbirth. Their race was born strong and built to endure.

"She fell or took some injury first?" Fili said without thinking.

Gilon shook his head. "She took no injury but the one that left her with child," he said. "My father would not even enter the house when her time came. He was ashamed of her. If we had had a woman as clever as my Nan to catch it before she showed…" He sighed, but the flow of his words had begun and they could not be stopped. "I was little more than a boy at the time, twelve years old, and my father tried to keep me out of the house, too. It was the first time that I stood up to him… I loved my sister and was not ashamed of her.

"It was my job to keep the pot full of water and boiling, to bring them clean water and carry away the blood bowls from Saira's bedside. Perhaps _your_ women do not make combat their custom, but that night, my mother and the midwife we had fought a war against death until the bedsheets were like a battlefield, full of bodies and blood. Two bodies, both very small."

Fili did not know whether he could speak around the knot in his throat, but he managed a painful, "I am sorry."

"As am I," Gilon said, nodding. He emptied the burnt leaf from his pipe and refilled it, offering the bag to Fili, but Fili shook his head. "It was long ago," Gilon said, "and I no longer think of her more than once in a year. It seems strange to me that on this of all nights, Nan's guest has arrived. And yesterday you arrived as Betta's guest, too. I wonder whether there is not a bad omen in it all."

"I do not believe in omens, good or ill," Fili said firmly. Gilon said nothing.

They sat in silence once more, and for a long time after. Now, there were two clouds of thick smoke swirling before the fireplace. Until recently, Fili's only real thought regarding children had been the understanding that he must one day produce an heir to continue on Thorin's line and, recently, to acknowledge that he could not do so with a human wife. He had not considered what would happen to Betta herself if he gave her a child. It seemed a thing not possible.

And yet, hadn't he once dreamed of his children, when he had been trapped with Kili beneath the dark halls of Angmar? He had believed Betta to be dead at the time, and in his dreams, they had been full-blooded dwarf-children, but in dreams, anything was possible. In the real world, where he was doomed to live, any child, even a half-breed, might kill his wife.

The more he thought about it, the darker grew his thoughts. Fili realized that he did not understand what mechanism was involved in bringing a screaming infant into the world. How did they travel from the belly to the breast? There was not much opportunity for the young nephew of a bachelor king to hear about such things. It must be a very violent surgery, if Gilon's tale were true, and could it not be possible for Betta to die while her child survives? Could Fili be left saddled with a half-breed infant, disowned by his family, while his wife lay in the ground?

He shook his head, refusing to believe it. Didn't he know that his race and hers could not have children? Elves and Men might manage it, but not Men and Dwarves. Weren't Nan and Gilon proof of it?

The smoke was getting too thick by the fire, and Fili had just made up his in to take his pipe out of doors when he heard the door to Betta's bedroom creak open. He kept his eyes on the fire, remembering what Gilon had said about the secrecy of Nan's work. If it were a tall folk-woman emerging from her night's labor, Fili was determined to respect her privacy and not speak to her, but he could not resist taking a single look back over his shoulder because it might be Betta who had stepped out of the room and not a stranger.

His eyes needed no effort to adjust to the gloom. He recognized the face. It was not Betta, but it was not a stranger either.

Almost, Fili thought that he was mistaken. There was no denying that it was a dwarf-woman who stood in the doorway with Nan. But it must be some other dwarf-woman. It could not be Frei whose face was shadowed with serious thought, whose cheeks glowed with the first blush of motherhood.

Fili tried to sink down into his chair to hide until the Blacklock woman had left, but Gilon coughed into his hand, drawing his wife's attention to them before either woman could say anything that they did not want overheard. Reluctantly Fili stood up and made himself known. Nan scowled at him and gave her husband a sharp look, but Frei was not angry.

"I had not thought to meet _you_ here, Fili," she said.

He had been shamed often enough tonight that he was used to the feeling, but he hoped that with the light of the fire behind him, Frei would not see the redness that colored his cheeks. He bowed to her. He was embarrassed to be caught visiting Betta. Could they trust this dwarf-woman, too? Frei was no friend of his, or of any of his kin, really, save Dwalin, but he could not imagine that she would eagerly bear this bad news back to Thorin.

"I did not expect to meet you at all, Frei," Fili said. "You are visiting your kinswoman, I suppose. Well, I have come visiting as well. You know Betta… my wife."

Frei's dark eyes narrowed and she stood silent for a long while. It took that long for her to understand the meaning of his words. She glanced at Nan, and the old midwife nodded only once to concede the truth of it – more than once would have been to support Betta's choice, and she did not do that.

"Thorin cannot be well pleased with this matter," Frei said carefully.

"My uncle does not know of it. I hope that he will not hear of it until I have found time to tell him myself."

Frei frowned, but she nodded. "Then I will wish you good luck," she said. "It is not a task that I would willingly undertake." She looked hard at him. "Only my husband and his brother have heard _my_ news yet. I would rather it not be whispered down in the mines before I make the announcement myself upstairs…"

"I am no gossip!" Fili protested.

"I am glad to hear it," Frei replied, "and I have no desire to be the spy who delivers your less-good news to Thorin. We are in agreement, then."

Fili felt relief course through him and he smiled without meaning to. "If I may, however, anticipate your announcement. Congratulations to you, cousin, and to your husband. This is a good day for you both." He glanced at Gilon who stood up suddenly and left his place by the fire. Without a nod or a glance at any of them, he slipped into the larger bedroom and shut the door.

Nan watched her husband go, shaking her head sadly, but once the door was closed, she turned her sharp eyes on Fili. "You should not be here," she said. "You will speak no word of what you have seen or heard here tonight."

"Not a word," Fili agreed readily. He had already promised Frei that he would not.

Nan turned back to Frei. "You know your schedule, now. Will you take an escort up the hill? This foolish dwarf is of no use to me, and I know that he would be glad to go with you."

Frei laughed, a sound that Fili had only ever heard her make in the drinking hall with her husband at her elbow. "No, I need no escort," she said, putting her hand on her belt where a long, curved dagger hung at her hip. Fili guessed that there would be other weapons hidden in the folds of her robe where he could not see them. "It is a sorry man who would waylay me on the road tonight!" she said.

Fili believed her.

"Before I go," Frei went on, turning back to Fili with a smile, "I think that I ought to offer my congratulations to you. You will not have many, I fear, once your news is known, so you must accept mine. They are sincerely offered. Betta is a good woman, for her kind. She is strong but with a gentle hand. You could do worse, even among dwarves."

Fili was amazed to hear so many kind words all at once from Frei, and a compliment to Betta as well. It seemed that good news brought good will with it, and he bowed to her many times before she told him that it was enough.

"To you, sister," she said to Nan, "I offer my thanks, and my apology. Both are also sincere. It was pride alone that kept me distant, but no more. I will visit you many times in the coming months, until the end of the growing season. I hope to visit you after as well."

"You will always be welcome in any home of mine, my lady," Nan said, bowing low. "Good evening."

"Good night!" Frei cried. "And give my thanks to your apprentice, too." She raised her voice loud enough that Betta must have heard it in the bedroom. "That woman will do honor to your fine profession."

"Thank you, lady," Nan said with another, deeper bow. Her words were modest but Fili saw the gleam of pleasure in her eyes. Frei's visit had brought with it a reconciliation that the old midwife had not hoped she would live to see.

Frei clasped her kinswoman's hands and bid her farewell. She strode across the room and out the front door without another glance at Fili, but he smiled to think of the new little cousin that she carried with her. A child would be a welcome joy back at the mountain, and it had not yet occurred to him that if Thorin had his way, Frei's child would be born while its father was far away on his journey to the Lonely Mountain.

After her guest had gone, Nan disappeared back into Betta's bedroom. Fili had no confidence left and he did not follow her. A moment later, she reappeared with a large quilt folded over one arm and a leather bundle under the other. Betta followed soon after, carrying a bowl carefully balanced. Fili stepped smiled at her, but after Gilon's tale, he was careful not to look into the bowl that she carried.

She returned his smile but did not stop to greet him. She carried the bowl to the other side of the room and carefully divided its contents among the dozen or so pots that lined the far wall. Fili opened his mouth to question her, but thought better of it. He waited until the bowl was empty and then stepped up beside her to look down at the thin, green sprouts. Almost every pot showed signs of some nub or thread pushing its way up through the soil.

Stalk and stem, they were all the same to him. "What are you growing?" he asked.

"Heirloom seeds. We will not know for a few more days," she said. "Nan insists that they are half root vegetable and half weed."

"No wife of mine would grow weeds," Fili told her.

Betta laughed. "No, but who can say what is a weed and what is not? Every weed has its uses, but I hope that these are… No, I will not say what I hope yet. They are listening and would spoil my plans if they knew." She smiled down at the pale, green shoots, then took his hand and drew him away.

"You are here," she said, turning her smile on him. "I am sorry that I kept you waiting, but what would you do now?"

"The night is warm, the moon is bright, and the sky is lit with lanterns. I thought that we might have a walk together… if your healer approves." Fili knew what she expected, but even if Frei's news had been good, he could not go into Betta's room tonight. He could not lie with her on her bed without thinking of his cousin's wife.

"A walk?" Betta frowned at him. It was not what she had expected, but she was not inclined to refuse.

Nan was applied to and quickly gave her permission. She was glad to get Fili out of her house. Her own husband needed tending. "Go and walk, then," she said, "but do not go too far. Be wary of the hillside. The ground is thawing and the gopher holes are opening up. They will catch your foot and turn your ankle if you do not take care."

"I will look after her," Fili said, bowing to the dwarf-woman.

"Or, I you," Betta said. She took her shawl from its hook by the door and traded her shoes for Nan's thick boots, and then they left the cabin.

The night was indeed warm and the moon really was bright, but a few clouds had begun to gather and veiled many of the smaller stars. The yard was well lit, but it was toward the darker ridges of the hill that Betta turned her face. She tried to draw Fili that way, but he dragged his heels and stopped her before they reached the slope.

"Come on," she urged him. "Before Nan changes her mind." She looked eagerly toward the crest of the hill, but Fili would not be moved. The free air did not lift his mood. He felt the shadow of the mountains looming over him and imagined his uncle's eyes glowering down. Frei was right and someday Thorin must be told.

Maybe Fili would not go, but Betta was determined to take advantage of her freedom. She released his arm and walked ahead of him, starting the long climb up the hill. Her spirits were high. She had followed Nan's directions faithfully all through the evening's examination, and she had heard Frei's compliments, too. She was proud of the work that she had done, and the work that she would do in the future as Nan's apprentice. She reached the top of the hill and looked back to find that Fili had reluctantly followed her.

"Do I go too fast for you?" she called down to him. "Nan does not let me go out at night, no farther than the yard." She turned her eyes east toward the grey horizon. "She says I am not strong enough, but you do not agree, do you, Fili? You are like your brother: you think I am strong."

Fili reached the top of the hill and looked around. He did not normally mind heights, not when he was hanging above the dark depths of an underground mineshaft, but this hill lay wide open under the massive cavern of the sky, and he did not like it.

"You are strong enough to walk half a mile and climb a hill," he admitted, "but I will not argue with your healer. Not to her face, anyway. I thought that we would walk and talk, not go adventuring over the mountains again. All this climbing leaves you breathless."

"Not the climb," she said, smiling, and kissed him.

He returned her kiss, but Gilon's tale was yet fresh in his mind, and Betta felt him hesitate. She stepped back and frowned at him, following his glance down toward the cabin.

"We have not gone far enough," she said quietly, and started down the other side of the hill.

Fili hurried after her. Last year's grass was long and dry and dead. Betta's boots slipped over it, and he had to hold her arm, but she did not slow down. He could only hope that they did not stumble upon any of Nan's treacherous gopher holes.

They reached the bottom of the hill in one piece, and Fili saw that there was a narrow gap along the ground between the hill that they had just descended and the second one that rose up behind. They stood at the bottom of a tight ravine and only a little of the silver moonlight reached them there. Betta started off down the path, but Fili caught her arm and held it.

"It is too dark down here," he said. "Not for my eyes, but for you…"

"I have been here before. I know my way. I have wanted to see this place in moonlight since I first discovered it." She waited, but Fili would not let go of her arm. He was too busy wondering whether now would be the right time to begin his apologies.

Betta sighed. "Well, you might go first, if you are so determined, and look ahead for me."

"If you are determined…" he said, reluctantly. It seemed that he would not get his chance to apologize, and that frustrated him until he looked at her face and realized that he had nothing to apologize for. She had forgiven him for leaving the moment that he had returned.

Fili looked ahead and saw that the ravine was not very long, and that it grew wider as it went. He told himself that this was not the worst way to spend an evening hour.

With a more willing step, he led the way and kept his eye out for loose stones or hidden furrows. Betta followed him with little care for her own footing. She knew this path. It ran only a dozen yards east before it opened out onto a sloping hillside. The steeper rise to their left was one of the long arms of Ered Luin, thrust out, but its end had been sheered off by a well-placed lightning strike and the face of it lay buried in the earth. When the broken stone had fallen forward, it had left behind a sheer, flat wall and a smooth, flat floor whose edged curved inwards on both sides pointing eastwards like the narrow prow of a ship.

Fili helped Betta onto the stone-ship's deck, and then climbed up beside her. He looked out across the moonlit hill and marveled to see the silver, long grass churned up by a strong breeze. Their ship sailed upon a sea of grass, and Fili felt dizzy looking at it. He leaned back against the wall behind him, unable to prevent Betta from walking up to the very edge of the stone.

"Take care," he called, looking over the side. "It is not a long fall, but there is nothing to stop you rolling clear down the other side."

"I know it," Betta said. Her hair was braided tight behind her head, but her skirt caught the breeze and pulled against her. She turned back to him. "You do not look well, Fili," she said. "Do all Dwarves get seasick on dry land?"

"We do not go on boats," he said, a little sullenly. He sat down near the wall. When he could not see the movement of the grass, his stomach loosened its grip on his throat and settled down again.

Betta returned to him and sat down. "Well, we are not walking now, and I am no longer breathless. You may talk and tell me, why are you angry tonight?"

"I am not angry," he said, taking her hand, "but my mood has soured, and I have too many thoughts in my head. I was left to sit with Gilon, alone and undefended. He is not well."

"He is grieving tonight," she said.

"He has told you why? It is strange to me. I did not know that childbearing could be dangerous for women of your race."

She looked away. "Some women die of it, certainly, if they are sick or small or very unlucky…"

"You are neither sick nor small," Fili said, hopefully.

"And I have been lucky so far in my dealings with dwarves," she told him, but there was an edge to her words that he had not heard before. "If that is all that worries you, then you have no reason to frown. But Nan has said plainly that it is almost impossible for your race and mine to breed."

"Almost, but there is a chance."

"There is no chance for me," Betta told him. "I will never have children. Not with you, nor with any man, and I am glad for it. I do not want them. Haven't I suffered enough loss in my lifetime?"

"If it is because of the danger…?"

"I have faced worse danger than that," she said. "Being a woman is bloody business." She stood up and walked away from him, back toward the edge of the stone. "I am tired of sitting still," she said, turning her face south this time. "I want to walk. I want to see new places."

"I thought that you had done with wandering. I have heard you call this place home."

She laughed. "Oh yes, this is my home, and I will not leave it until this is fully healed." She gestured to her maimed arm. "But you will leave. You must go east, only you will not tell me when."

"I do not know when we will go," Fili admitted, "but it will be soon. Only my own selfishness hoped to postpone the journey. When I know the day, I will tell you, but you must swear that you will be here when I return."

"That is a small promise to make. Yes, Fili, I will wait for you here until you return or until I know for certain that you will never return, and you must promise me that you will send word if you decide that Erebor is a finer home than the barren house that you would build with me."

"If I find Erebor to be a fine enough home, then I will send for you to join me there," he said, "and if my uncle will not let us inside, then we will build our house upon its slopes and wait until my brother is King."

"I would like to see that mountain," Betta said, thoughtfully.

Fili held out his hand and she returned to his side. Sitting beside him, she drew her shawl around his shoulder and he pulled her into his lap. They spoke quietly for the remainder of an hour while the moon sailed across the sky. Afterwards, Betta invited Fili back to her room for the night, but he had promised his brother that he would wake him upon his return, and he guessed that Kili would have many questions. Most of all, Fili must confess that he was a married dwarf now.

As he climbed the steep path to the hidden door, Fili thought of Frei and Dwalin and their happy news. He thought of Kili and the many nieces and nephews that he will give to their uncle to carry on Thror's line. Those dwarf-children would be brought to bounce upon their uncle Fili's knee and they would laugh at their aunt Betta's teasing and listen to her tales. Fili smiled at the thought, but he knew in his heart that he would never hold a child of his own.

* * *

**Sorry that this one is a bit late. The next one might be, too. I've gotten busy and it's springtime again. Also, I've been doing a lot more reading than writing lately, working my way through my father's collection of Terry Pratchett. The world has lost another good man and a brilliant author.**

**But don't worry, Calin, I'm not abandoning this story yet. Even if it takes a few more weeks, I will be back and posting again. With bells on!**

**-Paint**

**P.S. Did NONE of you notice my Monty Python reference in the last chapter!? I'm disappointed in you ;)**


	21. Frei's Feast

Kili had not really expected his brother to wake him when he returned that night – or that Fili would return in anything like time to wake him before morning anyway – so he was more than a little surprised to be shaken suddenly out of a deep sleep and dreams of long roads and orc battles to find himself staring into the bright side of a lantern.

"What now?" he gasped, throwing up an arm to shield his eyes from the light.

Fili turned the lantern away. "Brother, I am married," he said.

"About damn time, too," Kili muttered. "To Betta, I hope?"

"What? Of course, to Betta! Who else would it be?" Fili sputtered in amazement, but Kili was already laughing at his brother's outrage and wiping the sleep from his eyes.

"Very well, then, laugh if you want to," Fili said, "but our uncle will not laugh when he finds out."

"No, but if you want my advice, waking him from a sound sleep and making sure that there is no axe is nearby…" He saw the look on his brother's face and shrugged his shoulders. Thorin would not like it, but Kili was glad that Fili had finally made up his mind and sworn his oath to Betta. It would save Kili himself a lot of trouble in the future to have them both decided.

"Oh! And I have news for you, Fili!" Kili exclaimed. He repeated all that Thorin had said regarding the quest to regain Erebor, the small company disguised as merchants, the plan to scout out the mountains and go on toward the Iron Hills, and also that it had finally been decided: Fili and Kili would join their uncle's company. It was finished. They were going.

Fili sank down onto his bed, his expression wavering between eagerness and disbelief. Hadn't their uncle offered and taken back his permission once already? There was still a chance that he might change his mind, but still… "It is decided," Fili murmured. "We will go. We _will_ go!" He cried, striking his fist against his knee. This time there would be no change in their uncle's mind. He would not give Thorin the chance.

"When?"

"No later than June of this year," Kili told him. "Probably sooner. He has been making plans for an army, so it should not take long to fit up a dozen wagons for thirty dwarves. I would guess that most of the dwarves that Thorin would choose are already here. You and I, Gloin and Oin, Balin, and Dwalin, of course…"

"I am not so sure about…" Fili caught himself before he could betray Frei's confidence. "About the road," he put in quickly. "Why go all the way south to the Gap? Why not take the northern road?"

"I asked that as well," Kili said, nodding. "Thorin remembers our tale of orcs and snow-trolls. He knows that if he wants to go in secret that is not the way to do it. The passes through Hithaeglir are too dangerous for a wagon train, so it is the Gap or nothing."

Fili nodded. If he had planned the journey, that is what he would have said. "No later than June," he repeated thoughtfully. "I promised Betta that I would tell her as soon as I knew the day."

"You do not know the day yet. Besides, you can tell her the next time that you see her. It is too late for you to go back tonight. You need a few hours' sleep at least! Starting tomorrow, Thorin wants us both down in the training hall. No more mine-work for you. He wants us strong and ready for the journey."

Fili nodded again, but he also laughed. "How much more ready can we be? We survived the north, and greater perils there than any dwarf has faced for a generation. But do not worry, brother, I do not mean to slip away again tonight. Tomorrow will be soon enough." He looked down at his hands, at the soot still staining the fingernails and the scrap from an errant pickaxe. They were the marks of hard work, but not the battle wounds that he wished to earn. He looked up at his brother's anxious face and laughed out loud. "We are going to Erebor, Kili!" he cried. "Ai-mênu! We are going!"

Before Kili could react, Fili had thrown himself across the room onto his brother in his bed, laughing and wrestling with him playfully. "This will be a quest so much greater than Betta's. And think of the tales that we shall have to tell her when we have come home! We will have seen a whole part of the world that she has never known. I only wish that she could see it with us."

Kili laughed had pushed his brother out of the bed. "She may see it one day," he said. "If we succeed in reclaiming the mountain, you will send for her surely? And you will have had months and months to figure out how to break the news to our uncle. Who knows but that the dragon's hoard will soften his mood and convince him to accept your happiness?" Kili gave his brother a suspicious glance. "You do mean to wait until _after_ the quest to tell him?"

"I do," Fili assured him. "I will take no chances now. If he learned of her before we left…"

Kili nodded. "Good. I am glad that that is decided. But now, let me sleep, Fili. And go to sleep yourself! It is practically morning and I mean to meet you in the training hall immediately after breakfast."

Grinning, Fili blew out the lantern and took off his clothes. He wrapped himself up in the warm blankets on his bed but lay awake some time longer, still excited about Kili's news and worried over how his uncle would react when he was eventually told what Fili had done. Thorin would never celebrate Fili's oath to Betta, but at least his anger might be tempered with mercy. Surely, he would not disown his eldest nephew over it. Didn't the old tales tell that the Dwarves of Erebor and the Men of Dale had once been close allies and even, at times, hesitant friends? Betta was not a woman of Dale, but their marriage might be framed any way that Thorin pleased… perhaps as a sign of the return to old alliances? A symbol of trust between the two races.

Fili eventually fell to sleep thinking these and many other thoughts, but Kili was too tired to think at all. He had a long day behind him, and a longer day ahead. Fili had been too distracted by recent events and had neglected his sword. When they next met in the training hall, Kili hoped to catch him off his guard and knock him off his feet.

.

In fact, the next morning, Kili twice knocked his brother to the floor, but that was not the best news of the day: Frei had finally made her news official. She had spoken first to Thorin in his private rooms, and then, before the morning meal, Thorin had then stood by, smiling, while Dwalin proudly announced that his wife was with child.

Within an hour, the news had gone out through all of Ered Luin, being passed from mouth to ear, from the highest tower to the lowest tunnel down in the mines; almost before Kili was aware of it – he had missed the morning meal, being far too interested in catching an extra hour of sleep before training – he heard a dozen dwarfs saying that it was so. Wherever he went in the mountain, he heard the song of many voices, and as he walked into the Great Hall, he was met by the sound of dwarvish verse. Breakfast had been put away, but the long table was stacked high with huge barrels of ale. Every dwarf in the mountain had been invited to fill their cup and drink a toast to the soon-to-be child.

According to Durin tradition, Frei's own speech had been made to Thorin with only her immediate family in attendance. Fili must have been there, Kili thought, because he seemed the only one in the Great Hall who was not surprised by this news. Kili was surprised by the extent of the celebration. It was almost of royal proportions, but then, Dwalin was Thorin's good friend as well as his cousin, his closest kin in the mountains, besides Kili and Fili themselves. No one knew exactly what had passed between the two warriors on the slopes of Azanulbizar, but in recognize Dwalin's wife's good news, no expense had been spared.

Erebor was not mentioned that day, nor the quest, nor the long journey that was soon to come. Each dwarf's time was given to him as his own, and no work was done, not that day nor well into the next, but there were many young dwarves in the training hall working out their excitement on the wood and cloth dummies and on each other.

Fili exercised with his brother in that hall through most of the morning, but he was soon called away to be their family's representative in one of the smaller drinking halls and then at the homes of several families. From the grin on his face, Kili guessed that his brother was not so reluctant to perform _this_ duty that his lineage required. Not that he had long to think on it; Kili's own friends soon drew him off to drink and sing to his heart's content in their own halls and rooms. Though few of them knew Frei as anything, Dwalin's name and strong arm were well known to any dwarf-lad who thought to take up the axe or hammer – a bruise left by Dwalin was not soon forgotten.

Kili did not know how Frei spent her day, but every hour or so, news was passed down along rumor's road. No name could be chosen for the child until the sex was certain, but by midday, all had heard that Dwalin wished his son to be called Farin, after his grandfather, and Frei was determined to name her daughter Fala. The midday meal was a relieved affair; many dwarves had been worried that Frei would insist upon some strange name from the Eastern lands, but her choice, though unusual, was not so very different from the Durin tradition that anyone would complain.

Underground, day and night were the same, and there was no break in the celebration when evening came and the sun went down. If anything, the floors shook with even louder song and ever more ale was called for. A great feast was laid out in the Great Hall for the close kin of the happy couple, but plenty of food and drink was sent down for the lower halls. No dwarf would go to bed with less than a full belly. Kili finally found his brother again, less soused than he expected, but still smiling.

"Where have you been, Fili?" he demanded, throwing his arm about his brother's neck. "Gani has been asking for you. He said that you promised to crush a cup with him."

"I may have," Fili admitted, "but I have broken enough mugs already today. He will be with his own family by now. Now, hush, Kili. She is on her way up."

Kili looked around and realized that most of the other dwarves in the Hall were much quieter and more sober than he was, in appearance if not in actual substance. He straightened up and looked around. _She_ would be Frei, he had no doubt; the other wives were already in attendance, and of course Frei would make an entrance – it was her day, after all – but there seemed to be more ceremony going on than Kili had expected to find.

"What now?" he whispered. "I thought she made her speech this morning."

Fili shook his head. "Dwalin says there is a ceremony of the Blacklocks that she insists must be performed. I am not certain, but the Orocarni has never been well-settled. There are many more axe-maidens in the east. They are needed, and I think that this is their own custom."

Kili frowned. He knew that Frei was a fighter: she had fought at Azanulbizar, but that was long ago. Dwarves were dwarves, anyway. What new custom could it be?

At the far end of the Great Hall, standing beside his forefather's throne, Thorin looked anxious and uncomfortable. Dwalin was with him, speaking quietly to him, and Balin stood below the dais to one side. Of the three of them, Dwalin seemed the most at ease, and he smiled as he looked expectantly toward the large, front doors.

Kili looked at the closed doors, too. "What will they…?"

"Hush!"

There must have been some heralding sound that Kili missed, because the other dwarves who had been speaking quietly amongst themselves fell silent and turned toward the front of the hall. The wide, double doors were opened, and Kili looked on eagerly, expecting to see some elaborate procession, but it was only Frei who stood with a single dwarf-woman to attend her. A murmur of surprise and respect went up from the dwarf-men as they drew back and made a path for her down the middle of the Hall. Kili stared in open-mouthed bewilderment. Frei's clothes had always marked her out as a foreigner, but tonight she seemed to have stepped through the door straight out of the eastern lands.

Gone was the shawl that she wore about her waist to mimic the skirts that the Durin dwarf-women favored. Instead, she wore loose trousers sewn of fine leather and tucked into tall, heavy boots that any dwarf-warrior would have been proud to wear. In those shoes, one might walk miles over broken blades without feeling them. Frei's jerkin was likewise of fine leather, but the designs stamped upon it were strange and bore only the hint of a resemblance to those used by Durin's descendants. Still, it was Frei's mail shirt that caught his eye as she passed. It was not made of chain, no iron rings for a Blacklock axe-maiden; Frei's sleeves were built of many silver disks, each stamped like a small shield, and like a shield-wall they were laid against each other. Usually, Dwarven armor, even the best made, clinked and jingled as it moved, but Frei's armor made no sound. Indeed, no part of Frei's dress made any noise at all. She entered the hall and passed soundless through it as the dwarves of Ered Luin stared at her.

Kili stared at her. Her face was severe. Frei had always painted her eyes in a way that the Durin dwarf-women did not, but tonight her cheeks and forehead were lined with closely drawn runes. In thick, dark ink, a band had been drawn across her brow and two that went from below her fierce eyes to her chin, seeming to blend into the fine, black hair of her beard. Between the dark paint, her skin glowed like polished copper.

The paint reminded Kili of Dwalin's tattoos, even if his dye was permanent. The way that Frei had braided and piled her hair in a knot at the top of her head struck a cord as well. Didn't he have, Kili thought, stored among the earliest memories of his youth, the image of cousin Dwalin with his hair shorn away on either side and the rest raised up in a feathered crest over his forehead? But that was decades ago, before the last of his hair had fled from him, before the tattoos…

Frei passed by, and Kili turned to watch. She reached the end of the hall and stood before Thorin. She did not bow, and not a single dwarf in that Hall expected her to curtsey. Thorin's discomfort was palpable, but he had been instructed on his part. He stepped forward and did not flinch when Frei drew her sword. She knelt down and offered him the hilt.

"I cannot remember the last time that a dwarf-woman carried the axe _and_ got married, too," Fror whispered, shaking his head in disapproval.

Kili looked around. He had not heard the old dwarf sneak up on him, but that was not unusual. Fror had a way of being where you least expected him, and always when you did not want him. "You know the meaning of this ceremony?" he asked.

Fror nodded. "In the old days, we had our own, I suppose, but these halls have been safe for many hundreds of years. When a female warriors marries or conceives a child, she must give up her axe… or, in this case, her sword. It is time for her to settle down." Fror scoffed. "But what dwarf-man would marry a fellow warrior?"

"It seems you now have an answer to that," Fili said, frowning.

Kili glanced at his brother and then ahead at Dwalin who was doing his best to look as serious as the occasion demanded, but he could not hide his happiness and pride.

Thorin took the sword from Frei's hand and, for a moment, he held it and looked with curiosity at the blade and carved hilt. There were a swords in Ered Luin, but none that were so thin or made of metal so black. The dwarves in the hall held their breath while Thorin held the sword, and even Kili could see the tension in Frei's frozen body. He could only guess what it must mean to her to hand over her sword to any dwarf. He might be her king in this land, but Kili knew that she had little love for Thorin Oakenshield.

The moment passed, and Thorin handed the weapon over to Dwalin who sheathed the scabbard that he held ready for it. Frei stood up again and bowed to Thorin and to Dwalin, who broke out into a wide grin. The assembled dwarves let out their collective breath. Frei stepped up beside her husband and faced the crowd. This seemed to be the end of the ceremony.

Thorin had relaxed as well, and he smiled. "Let us feast!" he roared, and the dwarves cheered. Deep mugs full of hot ale appeared as if by magic in many hands, and huge platters of food were passed along the table. There were too many to all be seated at the same time, but that was alright with them. Many preferred to walk about the room with their plates in their hands, laughing and talking together in one loud voice.

Frei and Dwalin disappeared into the crowd, and Fili, too, but Kili stood still for a moment longer, the image of Frei's strange, painted face hanging before his eyes until Gimli appeared at his elbow and pressed a mug into his hand.

"Well! That is not something you see every day. I am glad that I did not miss it," he said. "Come, cousin, you look famished!"

Kili allowed himself to be led away. He was far from starving – there had been more than enough food available throughout the day – but that did not stop him from filling his plate with the good meal that was laid out before him.

Of course, the feast, as it were, did not end with the meal, but at some point there were fewer dwarves at the table than there were standing, and some of the older, quieter dwarves had gone to their rest. Dwalin and Frei had reappeared, and line of well-wishers formed as each dwarf and dwarf-woman carried their congratulations to the expectant couple. Frei had washed the paint from her face and changed into her usual western garb with a colorful shawl, but the sight of her arrayed as for war would stay with the descendants of Durin for long years to come.

Kili watched the line of dwarves wind its way across the hall to speak with Frei. Fili went, too, and if his brother's best wishes were conveyed with more warmth than was usual, only Kili's sharp eyes seemed to notice. He had little time to wonder, however, as he found himself suddenly choking on a throat full of ale after Dwalin stepped up and slapped him suddenly and heartily on the back.

"There now," Dwalin said, wiping a happy tear from his eye while Kili's eyes teared up from the sharp burn of the ale that had found its way up his nose. "I have finally done right by her." Dwalin had had a great deal more to drink than was good for him; he leaned against Kili's shoulder and almost brought them both down. Frei looked at them and shook her head at her husband. Dwalin raised his mug to her, still laughing.

"Someday soon, Kili, you will have your own wife and child, and then you will know how good life can be!" he said.

"Not _too_ soon, I hope," Kili gasped. Dwalin was not a small dwarf, and he had wrapped Kili up in a big, bear hug that nearly cracked his ribs. "Careful, cousin! I hope for many years yet to find my own joy, but if I am half as happy as you are, then I will count myself lucky."

"To each dwarf, his own heart burns with the hottest forge fire," Dwalin said, nodding sagely.

Kili was still puzzling over this bit of drunken wisdom when a loud cry brought Dwalin to his feet again. Thorin had arrived, and Dwalin let go of Kili to throw his arms around Thorin instead.

"Cousin!" Dwalin shouted. "You played your part well!"

"Well enough," Thorin agreed, "but it is over with now. This is our celebrated cousin – and Kili, too! – lurking in corners, lad? We must get up a tune and have a dance! How long has it been since these halls saw dancing?"

"Too long!" Dwalin cried, bringing up his mug so that half the ale landed on the floor and the other half in his mouth and beard. "My viol! Fetch my viol for me, Fror!"

"And my harp, too! And fiddles for my nephews," Thorin told old Fror who was always somewhere nearby. "Where is your brother, Kili? He must play with us tonight. Go and find Fili. No? Has he slipped away somewhere again? Haha! I am not fooled. He is down carousing with his friends from the mines. Well, let him be. This is a night for good fun for us all!"

Kili found that his comment was not needed. Gloin had appeared, and Thorin and Dwalin both cheered his arrival, turning away and seeming to forget him.

Kili had no intention of looking for his brother. He doubted very much that Fili was spending his night with the miners down below, but it was just as well. No one would miss him until well into the next day. The whole mountain was deep in celebration, and even the miners would need most of the morning to get their heads back on their shoulders. No work would be done until nearly noon, or perhaps not at all.

With a sigh, Kili searched the crowd for Frei and saw her near the back wall speaking to a pair of elderly dwarves who, it was said, had dwelt in the Blue Mountains even before Thrain had arrived. As much as he wished it, Kili knew that he could not neglect his duty to speak to Frei tonight. Ducking under one dancing couple and dodging around an overturned chair, he made his way towards her. He waited until Thrin and Barin had walked away and then stepped forward and bowed.

"My congratulations, cousin," he said, "and my good wishes to you and your husband."

Frei smiled. "We have had our differences, Kili," she said, not unkindly, "but I hope that tonight brings an end to them just as it brings an end to my hopes of joining you on your uncle's quest. Although he has had the good sense not to mention it to me, I expect you are glad to hear it."

Kili thought of the fierce fire in her eyes and the strength that she had shown as she walked into the Great Hall clad in her eastern armor. "If I am glad about that, then I am a fool," he said. "Your sword will be much needed by the company that goes east with Thorin, and now it must be sorely missed." Frei bowed to him.

"But if I may ask…" he went on, and hesitated until she nodded for him to continue. "The ceremony earlier… It seemed as if you have given up your sword, but that does not seem like you…"

She laughed. "No, it does not, and I would never give up that sword. It has been a friend to me through many dangers. No. Among my own folk, a warrior will only give up her weapon to her king and, rather than my husband, my king would have given it over to the care of one of my sister-soldiers. She would have looked after it until I had recovered from… well, from my current condition. In this western land, my blade must be put back up on the wall until my child is old enough to wield it in my stead."

Kili nodded, but Frei was no longer looking at him, or at the many dwarves celebrating around them. Her eyes looked ahead, into the future. A crash of noise that might have been music woke her from her reverie.

"Still," she said, looking over her shoulder as Thorin's make-shift band took up a lively tune, "you will have my husband's hammer to aid you on your journey." She turned back to Kili and added quietly, "I know that I am not wrong in trusting you to look after him."

"Of course!" Kili said. Frei nodded and she walked away, winding through the crowd toward the musicians. Kili watched her go. He craned his neck to look over the heads of the dwarves. He watched Dwalin muscle his way through the chorus of the ancient and entirely inappropriate _Kalin and Koin Rode East into Khand_. Kili laughed to himself and shook his head. Any dwarf who presumed to look after Dwalin in a fight would soon find himself left in the dust.

* * *

**Well, did you miss me? I wrote most of this chapter with sore fingers from tearing apart fences and cleaning off beanpoles. It's amazing how much work you can put into a yard and when you're done, it still looks like a mess!**

**Hope you liked this chapter. Hope you review.**

**-Paint**


	22. A Wizard is Never Late

**Middle-earth, and all who dwell within it, belongs to Tolkien. I am grateful to him for growing this beautiful garden in which our imaginations can play. Please review!**

* * *

It was three days since Frei's announcement and the enthusiastic revelry that followed, and Fili lay upon a sunny hillside not far from Nan's cabin. He was waiting. This was only the second time that he had been able to meet with Betta in daylight at the farm, but he had thought it best to deliver bad news with the sun shining overhead, adding its bit of light to her mood. Five minutes ago, Fili had confessed that Thorin meant to set out on their eastward road before June of the current year, less than six weeks from that very day, and she had yet to say a word to him.

Betta lay on her back, watching the clouds drift across the blue sky. The grass was dry, but the clouds and the heat promised rain tonight. Her head was pillowed upon an old blanket, but Fili lay with his head resting upon her lap; it should have been the other way around, he knew, but her dress was made of softer stuff than the stiff linen of his shirt, and besides, he was comfortable.

Or, mostly comfortable, he thought, as he absently plucked at the blades of grass under his hand. Another minute passed in silence before he sat up to look at her.

"Well, will you not speak?" he asked. Her face was as smooth as polished stone, but he could not read it.

"What would you have me say?" she asked. "I have always known that you meant to go. I have lobbied for you, even, and must have done some good if your uncle is going to take you with him. Now I know the date of your departure, but what does that change? Nothing. If I told you that _I_ have changed my mind, that I think your uncle's quest is a fool's errand, and that I wish you would stay here with me, what would _you_ say? Would you stay?"

He opened his mouth to answer her and then he closed it again. His choice had been made long ago in the days when he and his brother still played at dragon-slaying and swore on wooden swords that they would follow their uncle wherever, and whenever, he chose to go.

"I would _want_ to stay with you," Fili said carefully, "but I must do this. There is no choice for me."

Betta smiled and reached up to touch his cheek. "I know it, and I love you for it," she said. She laughed and added, "I begin to wonder whether you might not now take back some of the many times you sought to talk me out of my own quest. Now that you know how little choice there is in them."

"I take back none of my arguments," he told her. "There is nothing that I would change from our journey together, because it has led me here." His eyes drifted down to the other arm and blunted wrist. There was only one thing he would have changed.

"If I should die in the east…" he began.

"You will not." Betta said, turning her face away.

Almost, Fili was tempted to drop the subject, but he had given a lot of thought to it over the last few days, since a handful of words from Frei regarding Dwalin had been whispered in his ear and sent to troubling his heart. It may go against all that he knew, all that he had ever known, but he meant to submit to Betta's folk's customs. After all, he would be dead, wouldn't he? And there were many rights that ended with death. He could hardly expect her to act according to the honor of his family when they would not own her as their own. He must do right by her.

Fili swallowed the lump in his throat, clenched his fist and dug in his heels, as it were. He touched her face, pressing gently until she looked at him. "If I should die in the east, I would like you to remarry," he said. "Your folk do that sometimes, do they not? Take a second spouse after their first has died? I do not wish to put limits on your future. I do not want you to be alone." He wanted to be there with her, but that may not be his choice in the end.

"Do you… Is that something that you would wish to do?" he asked.

Betta frowned and looked away again, down the hill toward a little ravine where a trickle from the cold mountain stream watered wild onions and garlic. "I have not thought about it," she told him, and she did not want to think about it now. "Your folk do not remarry? Never?"

He shrugged his shoulders. "There is an old tale that I heard once of a King of the Ironfists who died young of a wound received on the battlefield. He was married but had not yet fathered an heir. His Queen refused to let him go until he had done right by her, but the King was determined to lead his folk into battle and so, out of spite they say, before he rode out to war, he presided over his wife's marriage to his younger brother and declared that any nephew of his would be as good as a son to him anyway." Fili frowned. "I suppose that the King meant to dissolve their oaths once he returned, but then, he did not… It was not a happy marriage, they say…"

"That is a moral tale if ever I learned one," Betta said. "But, I have no intention of marrying your brother, if that is the lesson you have in mind. I think that both Kili _and_ your uncle would have hard words to say on the matter."

"Of course I did not mean that!" Fili said quickly. "I thought you would choose… well, one of your own kind. Not that I have any doubt that you would be able to seduce another dwarf to your side, if you had a mind to do it. Dwarves do not remarry, whatever tales are told, but you are not a dwarf."

"No, I am not, and you will outlive me."

"But if I do not?" he pressed her.

Betta sighed and shook her head. Pale strands of yellow grass clung to her dark hair. "I have no plan to find another husband," she said. "But I did not plan on finding you, either. I will put away your words for some future time so that if ever I become a widow who wishes to remarry, I will consider myself free to do so. And he will not be a Dwarf. Does that make you happy?"

"It does not make me happy to picture you a widow, but I am satisfied." Fili nodded. He took her hand. "The journey to Erebor will be a dangerous one. It is difficult enough to think that I am leaving you alone for the year or more that this quest will take. When I think that I might be leaving you alone for the rest of your life…"

"But I am not alone," she said. "I have Nan and Gilon to look after me. I have Tom, who has me looking after him. Though, Tom will soon have a wife of his own, if I am any judge. He has milkmaids enough making eyes at him in the marketplace."

Fili laughed and was reassured on one point at least. He had never fully given up his jealousy of Tom. "I should know better than to worry about you," he said. "I see that you are wearing your knife again. And that belt is new. The work is good. Who made it for you?"

"Shall I tell you? You will not be jealous? Tom made with Gilon's help on the metal. His father did leatherwork when he was not busy hunting the hills of Dunland, and he taught his son the trade. There has been talk of expanding Gilon's business here, of diversifying. As a Dwarf, you should appreciate that."

Fili nodded. "It is good, because it will be good for you. Gilon's profits are your profits now, but I have less interest in the matter than you think. Once Erebor is regained, our people will leave Ered Luin and take their business east. Without Dwarves nearby, Gilon will soon find that he has more work than he can manage." Fili frowned thoughtfully. "I think that, if my uncle will not have me near to him, I will return to these hills. The coal mines are profitable enough, and there are smaller forges that can be managed by one Dwarf. Yet I think that I may count on a few of my folk to stand by me and follow my lead, and a handful of dwarves will be little competition for your family."

"You might partner in Gilon's business," Betta suggested.

Fili considered the offer, but he did not know whether he would go so far as to agree. It was a long time from now and too distant to say clearly what his plans would be after Thorin's quest. He did not like to admit that his heart could see no farther than the dragon. What would come after was all shrouded in darkness.

"We shall see," was all that he would say. "But again, I say, you are carrying your knife. Are you able to wield it with your left hand?"

"In time, I will be as strong with my left hand as I was with my right, but using a weapon is only half the reason for carrying it."

"And what is the other half?"

"Letting it be known that you are _willing_ to use it."

He laughed loud and long at that. "This, coming from the woman who would pull a knife on a dwarf in a room full of dwarves?" he said, when he could speak again. He wiped the tears from his eyes. "Who could have any doubt that you would use your knife! Is this adage yours, or did some wise man teach it to you?" he asked.

"Neither," she said. "I learned it from Frei."

"That sounds like the wisdom of the Blacklocks." He frowned. "Not that you need such teachings. I have always wondered and had not the courage to ask you before…"

"Ask!" she laughed. "Ask, and I will choose whether or not I shall answer you!"

"I have always wondered, because of the way that you spoke during our journey north, whether or not you truly had once killed a man," he said. He did not see the smile vanish from her face; he was looking down the hill, watching a fat jackrabbit dodge from stone to stone. If he had had a knife handy, he might have sent Betta home with dinner.

"I suppose that it is foolish to think of it now," he went on carelessly. "After all, you spoke that way before you knew us well. I expect that you were only letting it be known that you were _willing_ to kill a…" He looked at her, and the words died on his lips.

If her face had been stone before, it had now gone past that and through to the other side. Her cheeks were grey and her mouth a chiseled line. She stared into the distance, but the walls behind her eyes had been built of solid granite many feet thick. He was on the wrong side of them.

"It was a foolish question," Fili muttered. "You need not answer it."

"But you want an answer, don't you, Fili?" For all the hardness in her face, her voice was soft and painful to hear. "Yes, I killed a man, in Dunland. That is why I left that land and sought for aid among Dwarf blacksmiths instead. Do you want to know more, how I killed him and why? He deserved it. I will say that much about him: he deserved death and a worse death than the one I gave him."

Her hand was clenched into a tight fist. Slowly, Fili reached out and loosened her fingers, wrapping them around his own. "I want to know only as much as you are willing to tell me," he said. "I know that Men kill other Men, and often for no reason, but I believe that you had a reason – a _good_ reason – and that is enough for me." He smiled at her, and her expression softened a little, but her hand was shaking. He would not ask her, but he wanted to know. What had happened to her in Dunland? Perhaps Kili would know...

"Here is a better question," he said suddenly. "Those seeds that you have planted in Nan's living room, what are they? What do you hope they will be? We are far away, and they will not hear you on this hillside."

The change of topic was enough to shake her free from her dark thoughts. Betta took a deep breath and smiled; like a cloud passing over the sun, the shadow passed. There was more sadness in her eyes now, the memory of past injury, but he was relieved to see it fading.

"What do I want them to be? There are leaves enough now for me to hope that they will be flowers."

"Flowers?" he echoed, caught by surprised. Of all the things he expected the daughter of a Lebennin farmer to grow, he would not have guessed flowers. "What do you want with them? They are pretty, I suppose, in their own way, but what can they bring to a farm?"

"Bees."

He stared at her until she laughed at his curious expression.

"I have not told you that tale yet, have I?" she asked, lying down beside him. "In the spring of last year, I was walking through the hills north of Mithlond. I had passed a hard winter on the south side of the gulf, though not as hard as the one that came before it, which I had passed in Dunland, but I was weak and sick and tired of walking. I begged for shelter at a farmhouse, and the couple who lived there gave me lodgings for the summer months in exchange for my work. They planted the fields, of course, but they also kept bees, and I learned the trade from them. Gilon's farm encompasses almost the whole valley here; it is not as large as many farms, but still, it is too much land for our few hands… unless we plant flowers. Wild weeds keep themselves, and the bees love them best. We might have honey to eat and to sell!"

Her eyes were shining at the thought, and Fili nodded. He knew, of course, that some folk kept bees for their wax and honey. The Elves of Lindon were known for it, and Thorin's folk had sometimes traded with them, but it was not something that a Dwarf gave much thought to beyond the price per pound. The Men of the town could not trade over the mountains - there was no safe road north of the harbors - and so the price was very high. Jars had to be shipped from the southern fields near Mithlond.

Betta talked on about honey, bees and beekeeping, while Fili smiled and nodded along with her. He asked questions to encourage her, though he had little interest farming of any sort. His reward was that she forgot her past grief, and he even managed to hold his tongue when she spoke of the different ways the old beekeeper had smoked his bees. She did not need to know that Fili was picturing a buzzing tobacco pipe.

They talked for awhile longer, and then made love for awhile longer, wrapped up in the blanket that Betta had thoughtfully brought for the occasion. It was late afternoon before Fili bid farewell to her at the door to Nan's cabin and began his long, slow trudge back up the hill into the mountains. He reminded himself that they had not many more days left to spend together before it would be time for him to go east, but his heart refused to believe it. His heart looked only toward seeing her tomorrow, and the day after, and the day after that. If he had realized how little time they truly had left, he would have stayed the night.

.

Fili made his way back quickly through the dark tunnels that led from the north tower to his rooms. It was still early in the evening, and he would be able to have dinner with his family tonight, but first he needed to wash up and make sure that he had carried in no stray blade of grass in his beard or clothes. He smiled, remembering Betta's talk of bees, and the sweet smell of her skin.

He was so lost in thought that, when he turned the corner, he very nearly ran head-first into his brother. Kili was pacing the halls in earnest. His rooms had not been wide enough to give vent to his eager energy, and before Fili knew what he was about, Kili had his brother in his arms and had lifted him off his feet.

"Fili! You will never guess which guest has just arrived in the mountain!" he cried. He put his brother down and shook him. "I have been waiting hours for you, dreading at every moment that Thorin would send someone to look for you while you were away, but that has not happened yet. Our dear uncle is locked up tight with his guest and they are keeping their own counsel for now…"

"Locked up tight with what guest?" Fili demanded. "No, I will not play your guessing games. Who are you talking about? Who is here?"

"Tharkun, the wizard! Gandalf has arrived!" Kili said. "Balin has been expecting him, and Thorin, too, I suppose, but they seem to have been the only ones. I heard Gloin saying that he heard them talking, and he thinks that it means we will set out for Erebor even sooner than we had planned. They are all saying it. The wizard was in a hurry and rushed in through the Gates like a gale!"

"Gandalf is here," Fili said. He slumped back against the wall. If that were true, then he had no doubt that Gloin was right and they would be leaving soon. Very soon. He thought that he had weeks to spend with Betta, but in truth, he had only days. He had _had_ days; now, those days were wasted and gone. He should have given her more of his time, and spent less worrying and doubting himself. It was too late now…

"…to go down with me, Fili?" Kili's voice broke through his misery.

"Hm?" Fili stood up, shaking his dark thoughts away. It was no good regretting what was past; he must look to the future now. "What did you say?"

"I asked if you were going down to dinner tonight." Kili said again. "I was on my way there, as soon as you got back, but I suppose that you would rather rush off with your news to a certain farmhouse…" He watched his brother carefully, ready to catch him if he tried, but Fili shook his head.

"The news will keep," Fili said. "But I must clean up first." He nodded to his brother, and they started back along the passageway. "If there is a wizard about, then there will be a council, either tonight or in the morning, and I must be here when Thorin asks for me. Besides, I am famished, and I will not impose on Nan's hospitality a second time."

"You are always hungry when you get back from there," Kili said. He shoved his brother into their rooms ahead of him and closed the door behind himself before adding, "If Betta is your wife, then she should feed you better."

"It is a long, hard climb up and down those hills," Fili reminded him.

"Ha! You do not fool me," Kili laughed, giving his brother a teasing push. "It was not the walk that gave you an appetite. You earned this hunger lying on your back!"

"_Ai-ânu_!" Fili cried, tackling Kili onto his own bed. They wrestled back and forth, playfully, as they had not done since they were lads. Fili was not so hungry that he could not pin his brother down, but Kili won the match finally with a trick that he had learned from Dwalin.

The mock battle left both brothers sitting on the floor, leaning against their respective beds, and gasping for their lost breath. Fili rubbed the sore spot on his forehead and laughed. "To Erebor," he said.

"To Erebor," Kili agreed, rising to his feet. "But first, to dinner."

Fili nodded but did not stand up. "It _is_ what we have wanted, isn't it…?" he said quietly. "This quest, this journey… what I have waited for…"

"You are not changing your mind now, are you, brother?" Kili frowned down at him. "Fili, you cannot! We have worked too hard for this. You _must_ go."

"And I mean to," Fili said, rising slowly to his feet. "Only, I find that I do not want it as much as I used to. It is strange. Or, perhaps, it is not so strange since I do not expect to be allowed to live there long or to profit from the gold… but I mean to go. I am determined. Thorin must someday learn that Betta and I are married, and when he does, he will cast me out. No, Kili, don't argue. I know that he will. Only a fool would think that Thorin Oakenshield could accept such matters as they are. There is not enough gold in all of Middle-earth to buy his change of heart."

Kili hung his head. He knew his brother was right.

"But if I am to be disowned," Fili went on, drawing himself up proudly, "then I mean to give it my all. My heart is not changed, only torn in two, but the weaker part I may leave behind. I love Thorin, and he has all my trust, all my support and every ounce of strength that I have, until Erebor is reclaimed. After that… well, we will see what comes after that. Kili, I no longer want the mountain or the adventure; the first I shall not hold and the second I have already tasted and found it less wholesome than a settled life. But I mean to stand by my kin and my King. I can do nothing else."

Fili nodded, his jaw was set and determined. Kili hid his smile behind his hand. "If Thorin disowns you, brother, it will be a great loss to our folk. You make speeches as well as any king. Now, if you are done posing for your future tapestry, I think we've _both_ earned something to eat."

* * *

**Nope, I can't think of anything clever to put in this note, so we'll stick to the classics: REVIEW! PLEASE, REVIEW! **

**;)**

**-Paint**


	23. Soon to Say Farewell

As Fili predicted, Thorin called his council the very next morning, so early that several dwarves were still yawning and rubbing sleep out of their eyes. Kili sat far back in the hall, dozing quietly, too far away for Fili's elbow to find him – Kili did not really care what was said that day, so long as there was an adventure for him to join at the end of the meeting. Fili was exhausted; he kept his eyes open but was hardly able to listen to half of what was said that day. He had slept less than an hour altogether the night before, his head too full of too many thoughts for comfort. There were things that must be said before the company set out. He could not bear the thought of betraying his uncle's confidence, of lying to him for the whole of their journey to Erebor.

Fili crossed his arms and frowned down at the floor, lost in thought while the debate raged around him, long and heated, and the morning turned to afternoon and finally to evening. For hours, Thorin and Gandalf argued over maps and plans and passage over the mountains. Most of the dwarves who had been summoned for their advice sat silently by, too anxious to interrupt them. The wizard argued earnestly for speed and caution while the exiled dwarf-King pressed for speed and armies. Balin sat between them, doing all he could to calm them both.

The details of what was said in that council have been written down in many places, and by many an educated scribe, but in the end, as is well known, caution won the day and Gandalf was granted his greatest point: the company would take a hobbit with them.

Fili shook his head as he left the Great Hall, dragging his brother behind him. He would not have believed it if he had not been there to see it. A hobbit! Thorin Oakenshield would take a hobbit into his company! And a strange, very strange creature the wizard's hobbit sounded, too: eager for adventure, but reluctant to leave his little hole; used to dinning off of silver spoons but Gandalf assured them that he would not hold out for a higher fee. And that name! Fili was still laughing to himself at the thought of it. With such a given name as the hobbit had, Fili certainly would have chosen an alias to use. But then, HE was not a thief. Thieves were strange creatures indeed… just look at cousin Nori.

Fili put his brother to bed and then climbed the steep stairs to look out of the high window cut into the topmost peak of the dwarves' mountain. It was late at night and the stars were veiled by thick, rain-filled clouds. Had Betta waited up for him? Had she wondered why he did not visit her tonight? It was not too late to walk down to the farm and tap softly at her window, but he did not go. He heard the creak of metal and looked down toward the steep lawn that lay before the great Gates of Ered Luin. There was a flash of torchlight as the gatekeeper stepped out of his little hut to see the wizard out and off down the hill. Where was Gandalf going at this hour, Fili wondered, but did not need to wonder. He had caught enough of the urgency in the wizard's voice during the council. It would not be long before the old man returned and Thorin would be ready to set off. Days, no longer. Fili had made up his mind.

With one last look up at the stars – stars that would always, until the end of his days, remind him of her – he left the window and climbed slowly down again to the Great Hall. He scraped his boots along the narrow passageway, passing a sleeping Dwalin on his short stool to enter the dusty library.

Thorin stood before the fire, his hands clasped behind his back. His books and scrolls had been put away, the maps rolled up and tied in their leather skins. The long table was empty. Fili realized that his uncle had done with plans and was preparing for action, and that, above all else, convinced him that he had little time.

"Do you trust the wizard, then?" he asked. "You must trust him if you have agreed to bring only twelve dwarves with you on a secret journey."

"Trust? Yes, I suppose that I do. I trust him to give me as much aid as he must to further his own ends, whatever they may be, and to put himself in my way if I should go any way but his. I trust that if I had not conceded to his plan, then he would not help me at all." Thorin frowned. "And yet, if Tharkun's secret mischief brings me even one league closer to reclaiming my home… our home, then it is worth everything to me." He turned from the fire and looked at his nephew. "But what of you, Fili? Do not think that I have not noticed the change in you these past few weeks. Aye, and more in the last few days. You are not the same Dwarf who begged leave of me to go on a foolish adventure in the north."

"No, uncle, I am not," Fili agreed.

"You seem older. It is that woman who has changed you," Thorin said, watching him closely, but Fili's expression did not change. There was no blush of shame or any uncertainty in his eyes.

"She has," Fili also agreed to that. He had not planned to tell his uncle, had hoped to keep his secret until the end of the quest, or until he died, whichever came first, but it was not in his nature to deceive. The dark thoughts of last night had almost convinced him, but even now he might have bit back the words. "Thorin, I… I do love her."

His uncle did not move, did not blink, but Fili saw the sudden anger flash behind his eyes. "Certainly you would not be my sister's son if you did not learn to love any soldier who stood beside you in battle…" he said, his words stilted and forced out between clenched teeth.

"I learned to love her in battle," Fili said, "and went on to love her after. I have seen her since our return to Ered Luin. We have had no new battles here, yet still, I love her."

Thorin turned his back. "No. You are mistaken. I ordered you to stay within the mountain, and no nephew of mine would disobey my direct orders."

Fili said nothing. He would not argue with his uncle in anger. He wanted desperately to confess his secret marriage, but he did not dare to speak. He could not even point out that Kili regularly disobeyed orders to keep indoors, to stay out of trouble.

"Are you determined, then, to continue on this unnatural path?" Thorin demanded, turning on Fili suddenly. There was anger in his eyes, yes, but also a desperate plea for his nephew to contradict what had been spoken, to deny what both their hearts knew to be true. "What cause have I ever given you to dishonor your family in this way?"

Fili flinched. "I am sorry if you think that I have dishonored you. If I have, then it was unconsciously done, but I am not ashamed."

"Well, you should be!" Thorin snapped. "The greatest journey of your young life is at hand! Happier would have been this hour for me if you had kept your silence, kept your secrets."

"You would rather I lied to you?"

"Better a liar for my nephew than one wedded to a human whore," Thorin spit out the word human with more venom than the other insult.

Fili did not have the strength, or perhaps he had too much strength in him, to strike his uncle in anger. He squeezed his hands together behind his back and shook his head sadly. "If you cannot speak better of your future daughter, then I must go. Spit your hatred at the wall, uncle, but I refuse to hear it. The battle is over and my heart is won."

He turned to leave, but not before his saw his uncle's eyes grow wide with astonishment as his lips silently shape the word 'daughter'. A little of his anger softened and he said, "Fili, you must realize that no King Under the Mountain could ever take a human wife. Our people will never accept her."

"Neither the treasure nor Erebor have yet been reclaimed," Fili said. "What will and will not be accepted then remains to be seen. I love Betta. I have asked her to marry me, and she has given me her answer." He did not say what that answer had been, and Thorin did not need to ask. The little softness that had crept into his face hardened, and he turned his back once more.

"I will take you to Erebor," Thorin said. "You have proven your courage in the north, at least. If you have not made up your mind to abandon your kin to live in shame with this… woman, then I will give you the chance to prove yourself against a dragon. It will keep you away from her and, perhaps, in the wild, you will come to your senses."

"And Kili?"

"You know how many have agreed to the quest," his uncle said, impatiently. "If I refuse either you or your brother… thirteen is an unlucky number, and I have had too much bad luck already in preparing for this journey." Thorin sighed. "Tharkun will return on the morrow. He has some plan of his own, I suppose, and two days from now, we will set out toward the Shire to meet the wizard's pet hobbit. Be ready. I will not wait for you."

And with that, Thorin turned and strode past his eldest sister-son. He did not look at him, nor give any sign that he saw him. He left the library, and Fili stood alone among the dusty scrolls, anxious and eager but never ashamed. Two days. That was all that he had left. He could only hope that his uncle was not so very angry that he would not allow his nephew one spare hour to bid farewell to his wife.

.

"Two days," Frei said, shaking her head sadly and putting her hand on her belly. There was no bulge there yet, and it was too early for the fluttering in her belly to be the much anticipated quickening of her soon-to-be little one, but still…

"Aye, two days," Dwalin agreed. He was not as unhappy as his wife. He was looking forward to the adventure and to setting his hammer against a few orc skulls, but he knew better than to show his smile to Frei. She was pleased with their child, but still disappointed that she could not join her husband on Thorin's quest.

"Have you sharpened your double-bladed axe?" Frei asked, taking up the weapon from the large pile of blades, bedrolls and other supplies that Dwalin had gathered together on the table. She tested the blade with her thumb, but her eyes were on the rest of the pile. She knew that when it came to travel, her husband's eyes were larger than his strong arms and back; it fell to her to decide how he was to carry it all without tipping over backwards.

"Your broadsword, where is that?" she asked, putting down the axe.

"I left it with Dairn. The hilt needs new wrapping," Dwalin said, "and the scabbard is worn and wants patches along the edge. I'll not be marching through the wilderlands with a freshly-sharpened blade poking me in the back."

"So long as you do not fall into any deep water. All this weight would carry you straight to the bottom."

Dwalin laughed, and then he frowned. "There was something else… ah, yes. Dairn gave me this to give to you. He said you had ordered it some days ago."

He produced a package wrapped in sackcloth. It was solid and heavy as he handed it to her.

She sighed. "Yes, a lifetime ago, when I had hoped to have a use for it." She untied the string and unfolded the cloth, revealing a sleek, wooden crossbow carved of black oak and fastened with iron. A sheaf of arrows was with it, iron shafted and fletched with raven feathers gathered from the discard of her own flock.

Dwalin took the wapon and sighted along it. "I might have taken this as well if it were not made for smaller hands. I fear I would break it in two."

"Indeed you would, husband," Frei said, taking back her prize. She frowned at it thoughtfully. The device was small, indeed, and light… light enough to be aimed and fired with one hand, small enough to load with one hand, too, if the person who held it had the skill and the practice. "And yet, I think that I might find someone who would appreciate such a weapon as this. Yes, I know just the one…"

Dwalin frowned, but he did not ask his wife who that person was. He had learned long ago not to question Frei when she had that gleam in her eye. Sometimes it was better not to know what Frei Blacklock was up to.

Frei packed the crossbow away carefully, tying it up in string and cloth and setting it aside. She turned back to her husband and held out her hands. Dwalin smiled. Two days was not very much time to say goodbye, but they had both survived war, famine and grief in their time. They knew better than to waste what time that they had if two days was all they had.

* * *

**Sorry all. I know this one is very late, but I've had a lot to deal with this summer... and am still dealing with a lot, but I hope to finally wrap up this story in the next chapter or two. I want to move on to a new fandom. Maybe Doctor Who? Who knows? ;)**

**If you're still reading this fic, I am amazed by your patience and determination.**

**Many thanks,**

**-Paint**


	24. Consequences

The following day, there was such a bustle within the Ered Luin as would have greatly surprised the dwarves' taller neighbors in the valley below. In town, the only dwarves to be seen were the taciturn shopkeeper Thran and his two sullen nephews, Borin and Norin, going about their business and selling their wares. A keen-eyed observer might have noticed and wondered why there was no wagon that day sent down from the mountain to restock the storefront, but people going about their own business had no time to be keen eyed wonderers. Tom and Gilon were in the barn and Betta was helping Nan in the kitchen garden behind the house.

Inside the Dwarfhome was so much activity as had not been seen since the earliest days of its settlement when the refugees of Nogrod had fled north or, to a lesser extent, since the more recent exodus when Thrain and his folk arrived from the east.

Thirteen dwarves only would be leaving the mountain, their faces turned east on the following day, but there were many things to be decided, prepared and planned for. Supplies of cloth and food-stuff were packed and unpacked, weighed and divided, being carefully considered as to how much might be bundled up on a pony and how much might be carried on a hearty dwarf's back should the pony be lost. A travelling Dwarf might be short and short tempered, but he thought farther ahead than most elves and could carry twice as much.

While more logistical minds considered their packing, the ten members of Thorin's chosen Company were bidding farewell to friend and family. Nori and Bofur raised their chins proudly as they marched through passageways followed by the awed whispers of other dwarves, while Gloin and Oin sat and talked with their families, nieces and nephews, brothers- and sisters- and cousins-in-law. Not a word of Thorin's journey would be spoken outside the mountain, but inside, all knew what was to come. The younger dwarves especially, who had no first-hand knowledge of dragon fire and ruin, composed songs of triumph, already imagining the days of their King's success.

After his conversation with Thorin the night before, Fili decided that the best place to make himself useful was in the storerooms. A week ago, he had ordered a full inventory done on the stores; at that time, he had thought there would be much more time before they set out. Now, he walked the long, low rooms with Rís and her son Narin, tallying the barrels and baskets that had not yet been counted. If there were no unexpected delays – a thing that Fili had little hope of – then Thorin's journey to Erebor would take the better part of a year. Assuming that there were a dead dragon at the end of that time, still, the Company could not hope to send word back to Ered Luin inside of two years, and for all that time, the Blue Mountains must survive without their king or the two nephews who usually looked after things for its people.

"It must be a sore trial for us all," Rís said, shaking her head at the tall stack of potato barrels along the wall. "More so for you, of course, who must wander those wastelands without hope of help between these mountains and the Iron Hills…"

Fili laughed. "I do not think that Middle-earth has grown so dangerous that a Dwarf should give up all hope," he assured her. "We travel in secret; there will be little trouble. And besides, we will have a wizard with us."

Rís's derisive snort told him what she thought of all wizards, but Narin sighed and hooked his thumbs through his belt. "Such an adventure," he said. "Would that I were going with you, Master Fili!"

"Indeed! You think that you would face a dragon?" his mother said sharply but with a fond look in her eye. "You, who cannot even look your father in the eye when he asks you what chores have been done?"

Narin ducked his head and hurried away with his clipboard to check on the pickled herring in the next room. Rís smiled as he left. "He is a good lad," she said, "but still so young."

Fili watched the lad run off. Narin had not yet reached his fiftieth year. At that age, Fili himself had been steady and determined, already taking on responsibilities far beyond his years. He had had to do it to please Thorin, but Kili had been allowed to be as young and eager as he liked, as likely to duck chores as to do them. Fili smiled at the memory, wondering what his own sons would have been like… if he had had any hope of having his own sons.

"It seems that all is in order here," he said quickly, turning away from Rís to hide his face.

"There is the flour stores down below…" she began, but he shook his head.

"You have a good head on your shoulders, Rís, and a careful eye. I trust you to know your business and, under your management, I do not doubt that Ered Luin might easily survive five years without us."

Rís bowed low to him and said, "You are too kind, Master Fili, but your absence shall not be easy on anyone. We shall not be easy until we have you safe and whole at home again, or at least, have word from your uncle that the quest was fulfilled and we are all summoned east to join you. I must look to that day, for I know we must have supplies ready for that journey. There will be more of us than of you."

Fili bowed to her and politely took his leave. Tomorrow, he must bid farewell to Ered Luin, and it would be two years before he could hope to have sight of these mountain halls again. Two years before he could see these dwarves again; Ris and Thran and Gani down in the mines, even grumpy old Fror. What would become of these dwarves if Thorin died? What would become of Fili and his brother?

He shook his head and hurried up out of the storerooms. That morning, Kili had announced that he must go to the armorer's forge to see about a new sword belt before they set out. Fili went that way, hoping to meet him. He felt his heart was too heavy and he wished for the good humor of his brother to lighten the load and tell him that he was being foolish.

.

Kili looked over the belt with a careful eye. He stood alone to one side of the forge. Dairn was far to busy to stand long even with him. The head armorer had stopped just lone enough to be sure that the belt fit correctly and that none of the buckles cut into flesh or leather, and then he had been off again. Balin's father's bronze, flat-bladed mace needed sharpening, and the head of Bifur's pole-axe was loose and needed to be reset. It seemed that every member of Thorin's small company had an arsenal of weapons all in disrepair.

Kili stood in front of a polished-bronze mirror, adjusting the belt over his shoulder. He had brought his sword with him to test the weight and balance of the belt and, although it was a bit uncomfortable now when it was new, he could fell the thick strap settling into place. He had worn a sword across his back for decades and had the groove in his shoulder to prove it. He now felt more naked without his blade than he did without his clothes, but over his wool tunic, his leathers, his coat and his cloak, he knew that he would not feel the weight of the sword belt anymore than he felt the weight of his arm or his head.

"A fine prince you make, my sister-son," Thorin said.

Kili turned around and was surprised to see his uncle standing a few yards behind him.

"It is only a new sword belt," he said, taking it off. "If we are going to travel so far, I wanted… I thought I had better have a new one. The other had begun to crack." The cold winter of the northern lands had not been kind to the old leather.

Thorin stepped forward and held out his hand. Kili handed over the belt. "I asked Dairn to round off the corners a bit more on this one," Kili stammered. "And the buckles are plain iron. There was not time to plait them…" Thorin looked over the leather with a careful eye, frowning and running his fingers along the stitching until they reached the hilt of his nephew's sword and stopped. "Uncle?

Thorin smiled and looked up. He laughed and put a hand on Kili's shoulder. "It is nothing, nephew," he said. "Your old uncle is tired, that is all. The design is good on this one, but is it familiar? I have seen these knots before, haven't I?"

"I have used them once or twice on my own metal works," Kili admitted, his cheeks growing red. "I… I drew them myself using the old models from Thror's time. They are a little like his were. You don't mind, do you, uncle?"

"Mind?" Thorin murmured, looking more closely at the knots and seeing in them the echo of his grandfather's design. "No, I do not mind. Eighty years and you are still surprising me, Kili. I did not know what an artist you are."

Kili's blush deepened. "I am not quite an artist," he said quickly. "And I am not eighty yet. Indeed, it was Fili who suggested that I…"

"This is a good belt," Thorin said quickly and a little too loud, "but there is one change that I would like to make for you, if I may?" He gestured to a table nearby, and Kili nodded though he did not understand what his uncle meant.

"What? Yes, of course," he said, looking over Thorin's shoulder. He would not have refused his uncle anything, and he watched as Thorin laid the belt upon the table and took one of the hammers that stood upon a rack nearby. Thorin took his own knife from the sheath at his side and set the hilt against the underside of Kili's new sword belt.

"We must journey in secret, and so I cannot ask you to wear this mark openly, but wear it you will," Thorin said softly.

Kili frowned and looked from Thorin's grim face to the knife hilt in his hand. After a moment, he realized what his uncle meant to do. "No, you cannot…"

The hammer struck, and the sound of that blow rang through the forge. Across the room, Dairn looked up and frowned, but after a moment he returned to his work without any idea that the world had changed. Thorin put his knife back in its sheath and handed the belt back to Kili who stared at the mark now stamped into the leather as if he did not know exactly what it meant to him.

"Tomorrow, we walk into danger, Kili," Thorin said, putting his hands on his nephew's shoulders. Kili stared at him, confused and afraid. He tried to smile but could not make his mouth do the work. It did not matter; Thorin pulled him close. "Side by side, we will walk, and we will prevail! My nephew, my sister's son, my heir."

Kili winced for his brother's sake and then, upon opening his eyes again, for the first time he wished his brother far, far away.

"Fili," Kili gasped, and felt Thorin's arms tighten around him.

Fili stood in the doorway. Kili saw him but Thorin could not. His face was stern and expressionless, but even in the flickering light of the forge, Kili could see the hurt in his eyes, the betrayal. Slowly, Fili stepped into the forge.

"Uncle?" he said softly. "I have spoken with Rís. We will leave the storerooms well ordered. Should the weather continue fair, they will have a good harvest and more than enough food to see them through the winter."

Thorin did not answer him. He released his youngest nephew, smiled and nodded in his face. "Prepare yourself, Kili, but do not work too hard. You must rest and gather your strength for tomorrow. We will see to this hobbit and then… to Erebor!" He pressed Kili's shoulder, turned and walked out of the room.

Fili stood at attention until his uncle was gone, but although Thorin had passed by within inches of him, he had given his eldest nephew neither a word nor a glance of recognition, as if Fili were no more than a nameless guard or a sweeper that had crossed his path. Indeed, even to a guard, Thorin would have remembered his name, and a sweeper would have been greeted politely if distantly by the Lord of the Blue Mountains. Fili had become invisible, a stranger to his uncle, unworthy of recognition.

Once Thorin's footsteps had receded into the darkness of the outside passageway, Fili's shoulders sagged and his heart fell to the floor. Reluctantly, he took the sword belt from his brother's unresisting hands and turned the strap over. He guessed already what he would see stamped into the leather, and sure enough, there was Thorin's own mark.

"I did not know what he meant to do," Kili said earnestly. "I would not have let him, but I did not know."

Fili hesitated to touch the mark, feeling sure that his fingers would burn to feel it. It was Thorin's own mark used by his father and his grandfather before to tell any who could read it that _this_ dwarf, this dwarf but not his brother, was heir of the Durin line.

It would have meant nothing a year ago, or even a week ago. It would have meant nothing so long as Kili had an elder brother to inherit before him; the Dwarven laws were clear on that. But Fili had married a tall folk-woman. He could not inherit. Thorin would not disown him, not now when he needed Fili's strength and his sword on the quest, but that did not mean that he could not rewrite his will, as the tall folk say, and leave everything to Kili.

"Brother?"

Fili shook his hand and gave Kili back his belt. "It is good work, brother," he said. "I am not angry with you."

"He will change his mind again, Fili," Kili said. "You told him about Betta. Of course he is angry, but he will forgive you in time. Once we have Erebor back…"

Fili held up his hand. "Do not offer me false hope, Kili. I am resigned. Indeed, I am grateful that he has not cut me from the Company as well. I will ride out with you tomorrow. I will still fight side by side with my… kin." He felt his throat close up around the word but swallowed the lump that it left there. "And besides," he said, putting on an unconvincing smile, "now that Thorin knows what I have done, there is no longer any need for me to sneak about my own home like a thief. Betta will not yet have heard what we are up to. I must go to her and deliver this bad news in person. I must hope to have a warmer welcome from her than I have had from our… from your uncle."

"Fili…" Kili reached out his hand, but his brother shook his head and turned away. Kili watched him walk out of the armorer's forge, his shoulders bowed under the weight of his grief, but Kili felt certain that Thorin would, in time, mend this breach and welcome his nephew back home. Their uncle was quick to anger and slow to forgive, but Fili was Fili and Thorin's own nephew. If a Dwarf could forgive no one else, still he would forgive his own family.

Once Erebor was regained and the dragon destroyed, once their uncle had feasted his eyes on the long lost treasure of his grandfather, then Fili would be returned to his rightful place as heir and Kili could go back to being Kili. In his heart, he knew it to be true.

.

Kili's thoughts in the armorer's forge were almost exactly the opposite of what his brother was thinking as he trudged through the halls of Ered Luin toward the front door. Those few dwarves who noticed him stepped quickly out of his way and sought to avoid his eye. Knowledge of Fili's fall from honor had not travelled farther than his uncle and brother, but Fili's dark look was enough to send off any Dwarf who might have been tempted to call out to him.

Thorin would never forgive him, Fili knew. He had gone too far. The nephew who had done everything that had ever been asked of him had finally done something for himself, and decades of loyalty and love could not win him any clemency from Thorin's judgment. When Erebor was reclaimed – _if_ Erebor could be reclaimed – that would be the end. The most that Fili could hope for would be that Thorin would not deny Kili the freedom to visit his humiliated brother in exile.

He had reached the main hall and approached the front door, expecting to continue dragging his feet out into daylight and over the hill to Gilon's farm, but he was forced to stop short in surprise before he had even reached the threshold. Two spears crossed suddenly in front of him, held in the shaking hands of two nervous guards.

"I'm sorry, my lord, but we have orders…" the one on the left managed to mumble.

"Orders? What orders? Who from?" Fili demanded. He did not need to ask the traditional question of whether or not they knew who he was. Every dwarf in the mountain recognized that mane of blonde hair and those cold blue eyes. Of course they knew who he was, that was why they exchanged a frightened look before the guard on his right answered him.

"Orders from the Captain, Master Fili," he said. He was younger and more eager to please. "King Thorin has sent word that no dwarf is to leave the mountain, not until the his Company departs, and even then, not for three days after."

"Three days? That is madness!" Fili said, more annoyed than angry. "It will cause more comment among Men if we are NOT seen than if an army of merchants bought up all their food, canvas and horses!"

The first guard shrugged. "That is the order we were given, my lord, and with such force as we dare not disobey. Thran and his nephews are allowed out, to keep up appearances, but no one else. I suppose that we might…" he shot a look at his fellow guard, "Perhaps if your uncle were to give you written leave…?"

Ha! Fili knew how likely that was. "No. You must do your duty, and I must do mine," he said, turning away. The guards exchanged another anxious look, but as Fili left them without another word, they shrugged and went back to their guarding. It was worrying enough that they had been asked to stand facing _into_ the mountain, but to do that as well as be cross-examined by Thorin's heir was more than they had put in for.

At least, thought the older and, perhaps the wiser, of the two of guards, at least they did not have whatever duty it was that Fili now set out to do. The emptiness in Thorin's nephew's eyes was chilling to behold.


	25. Terms of Surrender

**Middle-earth, and all who dwell within it, belongs to Tolkien. I am grateful to him for growing this beautiful garden in which our imaginations can play. Please review!**

* * *

Betta stood in the doorway of the cabin and looked out at the night. It had been two days since she had last seen Fili. Two days since she had bid farewell to him upon this very spot.

Nan and Gilon were not at home tonight. It was the anniversary of their own private wedding over thirty years ago. The weather was warm, and they had packed a bag and gone up into the hills that morning to celebrate it as they saw fit. Nan had told Betta that she would not see them until well into the next day. On that assurance, Betta had invited Tom to eat his dinner in the house. He had refused, of course, out of respect for Nan's prejudice, and so Betta had dined with him in the barn.

All day, he had been cheerful, but when evening began to fall, she saw the confusion in his eyes that were often glancing toward the hill, and toward the town beyond. He wanted to offer to stay at home with her, to prevent her being left alone and unprotected, but Betta knew that Tom had been courting a young woman from town, a very pretty thing, if a bit squint-eyed, and she was not yet so captivated by the sandy-haired blacksmith's apprentice that her love would tolerate a night's neglect.

Betta had ordered Tom into town, and the young man had taken his wages and gone with gratitude. Now, she could just make out the silhouette of his broad shoulders at the crest of the hill before he started down along the road.

She sighed and went back inside, shutting the door behind her. It was strange, being alone in this small but empty house. It was _her_ house, to be sure, but it would be some time yet before she felt that it was hers. Her eyes fell upon the crossbow hanging in the corner that Frei had delivered to Betta that morning. She had brought instructions as well for its care and use, and Gilon had set up a large bale of hay behind the barn for Betta to shoot at. She had nearly hit it once.

Betta sat down in her chair near the fire and took up her sewing from the basket. She still hated the work, but thought that Nan would be pleased to see what progress she had made in the dwarf-woman's absence.

She had been at it for nearly an hour before the knock came at the door. She was startled, but glad and threw aside her work, ran to the window. The dark shape of a dwarf stood hunched up on the stoop, his face turned stubbornly toward the door so that the little moonlight that was out did not touch his face. But who else but Fili would come visiting at this hour? What other dwarf would come to Nan's cabin? Betta unfastened the latch and threw open the door.

She might have thrown her arms around the old dwarf, too, but the light from inside the cabin shone upon dark hair and a scowling face. The dwarf stared up at her. "I am Fror," he said, and bowed. There was no 'at your service' and no 'good evening', either. He stood up again and frowned at her angrily until she invited him inside.

"I know you," she said, shutting the door behind him. "If you will not pretend courtesy, then neither shall I. What do you want?"

Fror entered the house as if it belonged to him. He strode forward and set a long, wooden box down atop the dinner table. Without a word, he opened the box and took out an ink well and blotter, a brush and length of parchment. Only after he had laid out his scribe's desk did he notice her and speak to her again.

"I have been sent by my lord, Thorin Oakenshield, to negotiate the terms of your surrender," he said.

"Surrender?" she echoed in surprise and she nearly laughed, but Fror's face was so stern, that she did not dare to laugh at him. "Might I ask what battle I have been fighting, and against whom, and how goes it? Not well, if you think me ready to surrender to your lord."

She was playful, but Fror was not. "You have bewitched my lord's eldest nephew. I have been authorized to negotiate terms on Master Thorin's behalf. He wishes to know how much will it cost him to have you gone from this land. I am authorization as well to offer transportation of you and your belongings back to the southern lands from which, as my lord understands it, you have come."

Betta stared at Fror for a long while, indignant and insulted and unable to speak, but she was no fool. She had spent enough time around Dwarves to understand a little of their ways. Eventually, she forced a smile for the old dwarf and sat down at a chair across the table from him, stretching out her arms as if she did indeed mean to negotiate. Fror lifted up his pen, prepared to write down her answer that he might carry it to his master.

"So, Thorin means to pay me off," she said. "That is very… human, of him."

Fror scowled but said nothing. He did not write _that_ down, but she did not need him to. "I see now how it is," Betta murmured to herself. "This is the Honor of Dwarves." She sighed. "You may tell Thorin that there is nothing he can give me that I would value greater than what I have here, and my leaving will not restore his nephew to him. Fili is his own and will do as he pleases."

Fror blotted the ink on his paper and scowled at her, but before he could speak, the cabin door opened again. Betta had not latched it, and now Thorin stood with the night behind him, frowning into the house that he had scorned to enter for over thirty years. He must have been listening outside; he certainly looked scornful enough to have heard.

"Leave us," he told Fror. The old dwarf needed little encouragement. He packed up his pen and ink and hurried out of the cabin.

"You did not speak so bold when last we met," Thorin said, once they were alone.

"No, but then I was in your house. Now you are in mine." Betta did not stand to greet him. She only watched him warily as he walked about the room, glancing over the fixtures and furniture with indifference.

"Not much of a house," he muttered. "Wooden walls," he said, as if it were something to be ashamed of.

"A cave is as good as a castle, if you have wandered long in the wild," she told him. "You have had some experience in this," she added matter-of-factly, and he looked at her with surprise.

"My nephew has told you some of our history, I see, and more than he should had done, I have no doubt. I would say that any dwarf who told such secrets was not my of blood, except that such words stain the honor of my sister who laid claim to him."

"I had heard that dwarves were loyal to their kin..." Betta said quietly.

"Is that your plan? And your pride!" Thorin slammed his fist down upon the table. "You hope to force yourself into my halls through this unnatural marriage? You are no daughter of mine, whatever Fili might say!"

Betta was startled by his anger, and surprised that Fili had admitted their marriage to his uncle already. He had told her that he meant to wait.

She put those thoughts aside, knowing that she could not win this battle of wits with Thorin Oakenshield if she had half her mind on other things. She met his harsh look and said truthfully, "I have had no plan, and certainly none that concern you or your halls. You will not believe anything that I say, but I tell you now that for the better part of my journey with your nephews, I doubted the lineage that they claimed. I thought that your nephew was another mercenary or blacksmith when first I began to love him… many Men claim greater parentage than they are owed."

"And what do _you_ claim, woman?" Thorin demanded with scorn in his words and his look.

"For my family? I claim nothing at all. My mother was the daughter of a farmer, well-off but of no consequence. My father was a coward who married her for her land." Betta frowned to herself and shook her head. "For myself," she went on, "You know what I have done that is worth your gratitude and better treatment than I have received so far. Fili told you..."

"You will not speak his name!"

"Do you own the name also, as well as himself? Is that a part of your rights as King?" she asked, smiling, but there was no jest in her words.

"He is _my_ nephew," Thorin growled, rising to his feet.

"A moment ago you meant to disown him."

Thorin clenched his fist and stared down at the small, insolent woman. She infuriated him with her smiles and her steady gaze, but when his eyes fell upon her right arm, the scar-twisted blunt end of her wrist that she had unwrapped from its bandages when she thought she would be safely alone; when he saw the wound she had taken, his anger was diminished. She was right that both Fili and Kili had vouched for the truth of how she had lost that hand. When she let go of Kili's hand to save him from an orc's blade, she could not have known that the Lossoth hunters would fish her out of the river on the other side. There was strength and honor in this woman that Thorin did not like to admit, but admit it he must. She deserved more respect than he had yet shown her.

He sat down and laid his hand open upon the table. "You must admit that I have the better claim on my own nephew," he said. "What is your price? A chest of gold? A good horse?" He looked at her with clever eyes, used to dealing in trade with Men. "Perhaps a sword, forged with a dwarven skill? Kili tells me that you are a fighter, and you might still carry a shield on your right arm. I have led armies into heated battle against overwhelming odds, but never have I been so poorly placed as this. Whatever you ask, I will pay to have my nephew back."

Betta looked at him with pity in her eyes. She shook her head. "I do not have him. He is yours to take, not mine to give. If you want to keep him, you must pay _his_ price. Take him to Erebor. Take him away from me."

Thorin's eyes narrowed with suspicion when she named the goal of his secret quest. "If I were going that way, it is a long journey, two years at least, and there is no certainty that any who go with me will return. You have bewitched him under my very eyes, and now you expect me to believe that you would willingly let him go?"

"I told you, he is not mine!" Betta clenched her fist, for the first time showing _her_ anger. There were tears in her eyes threatening to fall. "Fili says that there is honor in your quest. He wants it, and I want him to be happy. Is it my race or my womanhood that makes it so hard for you to believe that I could want what is best for my husband!"

Thorin looked hard at her. Even _he_ could not deny that there was truth in her eyes. "I had already made up my mind to take him and his brother with me," he told her. "We set tomorrow, early. I had hoped that you would be reasonable, that you would agree to give up your place here so that I might name my nephew as regent to Ered Luin once Erebor is regained. Now, I see that I must keep him with me in the east. You should have taken the gifts that I offered. Now you shall have nothing."

"Perhaps," Betta agreed sadly.

Thorin stood up and turned to walk out, but he stopped short with a sharp intake of breath. Fili stood in the open doorway, watching his uncle with cold eyes. How long his nephew had stood there, Thorin could not say, but Betta knew. She had been facing the doorway.

Thorin scowled at the trick they had played, but he recovered himself quickly. "I expect you and your brother to be ready to ride on the morrow," he said. "If you are not in the Shire at the appointed hour, then I shall know that I have only one nephew who loves me."

With that, Thorin left, pushing past Fili in the doorway without looking at him. Betta did not look at Fili either. She stared down at her hand resting on the table. She did not want him to stay because she asked him to; she wanted him to stay because he wanted to, but she could not stop the tears that watered her cheeks now that the uncle had gone.

She heard footsteps and saw Fili's large hand cover her own. "I had come to tell you that I must leave on the morrow," he said. "I had hoped to break the news more softly."

She nodded. "I meant what I said. I do not mean to keep you here."

He pulled up a chair and sat down beside her. "I know. I do not know how long I will be gone, but I had hoped to spend this last night with you." She looked at him, and he smiled. "Unless my uncle has offered you a greater prize. Tell me, what did he offer you? Though I fear it will hurt my pride to hear it."

She laughed. "He offered me a sword!" she said. "As if I knew how to wield it without cutting off my own arm."

That was just like his uncle, Fili thought and he laughed.

He asked to spend the night with her, their last night together until he returned from the east, and she readily agreed. There was still sadness in his eyes, and she guessed that there always would be, but she could no more refuse his company than she could sever the remaining hand from her arm.

Fili stayed the night at the cabin, talking quietly with Betta in front of the fire and later sharing the warmth of her bed, but he rose again in the early morning hours while she was still fast asleep. He kissed her forehead before he left her and laid upon the pillow the golden locket that he had made for her, delicately filigreed and enclosing not only an etched miniature of his face, but also a lock of his yellow hair carefully knotted with black strands from his brother's head. Fili was determined to leave her a piece of both her husband and her brother-in-law to hold after they had gone. A reminder, in case they did not return.

* * *

**It's always sad when I start to feel the story winding down. A farewell chapter and an epilogue, then I leave behind the Durin brothers and move on to other things.**

**"Books ought to have good endings. How would this do: and they all settled down and lived together happily ever after?"**

**-Paint**


	26. Goodbye

Kili was still in bed when his brother returned to their room to tell him that the sun had risen. There were still a few things left to pack, extra weapons, a spare cloak; food that other dwarves had wrapped for them needed to be put into packs and loaded on to their ponies. Twelve dwarves would go to Erebor with Thorin Oakenshield, but not yet. There was always a risk that they would be watched. They were setting out into the wild, and many foul creatures would have been glad to claim one or all of the heads of the three Durin heirs.

Fili spoke very little that morning and it was an hour before Kili could get out of him a few words regarding their uncle behavior the night before. It was a terrible insult, what Thorin had done, but not very surprising to either nephew. Fili might have felt the sting of it less had his uncle had allowed Fror to continue the negotiations; for Thorin to put himself forward and dirty his hands in such unsavory business only proved how far he would go to prevent his nephew's happiness.

It was the morning of April the 26th, and twelve members of Thorin's company left Ered Luin in small groups of two and three dwarves at a time. They went separately, putting at least an hour between them and starting off in different directions, some through the town, some over the hills north and south of it, but they would all make for the Shire. Gandalf had arranged their meeting at the home of his eccentric thief on the next day's evening and he had gone ahead of them to make sure the little fellow was ready. Thorin had sent most of his baggage to the Bywater Inn where in two day's time, his company, decided in purpose and (hopefully) with full bellies, would have their official setting-out.

Fili and Kili were the second party to leave the Dwarfhome. Though Thorin had ordered them to journey along the southern road and crossing the Little Lhun before turning east toward the Shire, but ass soon as they had passed through the Great Gates, Fili sent their course directly east, taking the same winding road that had led them home after their adventures in the Forodwaith. To protect their ponies, they rode around the northern slopes, avoiding the hard climb up over the hill and approaching Gilon's valley from the unlikely eastern direction.

The farm was empty, its fields deserted. The rippling wild grasses had been cut down to make room for Betta's honey flowers, but here and there, the tallest stalks still shivered in the cold early morning. The chickens were huddled in their roost and the goats lay together against the wall of the barn like lumps of dun colored wool. Small tufts of weed had begun to force their way up through the hard-packed ground in the yard, but the sky was overcast and grey and it made the otherwise green thistle look gray.

In the yard, Fili dismounted and Kili held his pony's bridle while he walked to the front door and knocked. The house was dark and empty. Nan and Gilon were still up in the mountains together. Fili knocked again and waited a moment before he tried the latch. He had left this place three hours ago before sunrise, and perhaps Betta was still abed.

"Brother," Kili called to him.

He looked up and followed Kili's eyes. Betta had come around the barn. She had been hidden from them, probably watching for their approach along the western path. Her new clothes had arrived from the tailor's shop, and she appeared as her old self, clad in thick trousers, leather jerkin and a wool cloak thrown over her shoulders. The locket that Fili had given her hung like a drop of gold from her shoulder; she had pinned it over the clasp of her cloak as the old Ranger, Harandir, had worn his silver star. Beneath her cloak, Fili had no doubt, was her old dagger, and at her side hung Frei's gift, the sturdy crossbow. He stepped out into the yard to meet her.

"I was not sure whether you would come back," she said. Her hair was tied in a long, tight braid, but he found a few loose strands to push away from her face.

"We must say goodbye," he said. "Or, farewell. That is less forbidding."

"_You_ will fare well," she said, catching hold of his hand. "I know it. You will bring back chests full of gold and more stories than can be told in a lifetime, better stories than mine for you will go into places where I have never been. I want to hear all about the mountain passes and the Great Greenwood when you return."

He laughed. "All that and more," he promised. "I shall bring you back a dragon's scale set in steel. That shall be your blade, not any sword of my uncle's making."

"Hush, now!" she said smiling. "I have forgiven him. He will take you away to win honor. Once he has his mountain full of gold, he will forgive you. Now, go. Fare well. I know you cannot stay long. Go look after your brother and don't let him fall into any snow banks or riverbeds."

"Perhaps we will meet elves along the way," Fili said, not ready to leave her yet. "Perhaps Kili will threaten Thorin with a wife even taller than you, and then he will forgive…"

Betta pressed his hand and turned her face toward the yard where Kili waited at a distance, giving them their privacy. She smiled, but her cheeks were tense and tight. He had stayed too long and the tears were gathering in her eyes, and she looked up to stop them falling.

"I _will_ return," Fili promised her. "Once Erebor is regained. My uncle shall not keep me from you."

"And I will be here, waiting," she said, "until you return. What more is there to say?"

He looked at her, and his look was enough. He kissed her, and that spoke louder than his look. It was a hundred heartbeats or more before Fili remembered his brother and the ponies. He walked Betta back to them.

"I want plenty of tall tales from you, too, Kili," she said, looking up at him sitting awkwardly in his saddle. "I trust you to tell me honestly all the foolish trouble my husband gets into when I am not there to look after him."

"Hah! I have not room in my head to remember it all," Kili said. He could not find the humor to laugh at his own joke, but he climbed down from his pony to embraced her and kiss her cheek. "You might put on a false beard and slip in with the company," he whispered in her ear.

"Yes, and you might put a feather in your hair and be mistaken for an eagle!"

Kili mounted his pony again and rode a little distance away. He did not hear their final words to each other. He closed his ears to them. It was not his business, but he thought that Fili looked a little less sad when, back on his pony, he rejoined his brother.

"Well, let us be off," Fili said. "Quickly now. The sooner we leave, the sooner we will return."

He looked back only once and raised his hand to Betta, but she waved them off, standing in the yard as they rode away. She watched until their ponies rounded the foot of the hill, stealing them from her sight, and then she turned and climbed the long, steep road to the crest of the southern hill. From there, with much effort, she could make out the two shadows on the eastern road. She stood watching until once again they disappeared into the distance and she could climb no higher to see them. Only then, when she knew they were gone, did she kneel down upon the cold, hard ground and weep.

* * *

**.~O~.**

**Epilogue**

This was all the tale that Ferin told Gimli, first as they sat together upon the stone walls of Minas Tirith and later when they rode in the caravan of dwarves returning north to Erebor after the coronation of Aragorn II. Fala rode with them, correcting his brother if ever he strayed from the tale or from the truth. It was all that either brother or sister knew of their parent's lives together, save for a few words here and there than Nan or Gilon had let slip during their childhood. Neither of their adopted grandparents had spoken of the time after Fili's departure, before the birth of the twins. Ferin's first memory had been of being six years old and helping Gilon and Tom in the forge. Fala's was of their mother's bee fields and the sweetness of honey on her tongue.

It was not until the brother and sister arrived at Erebor and were welcomed into the halls of their father's uncle that they learned what their mother had done in during those missing years. Among the fine halls of Erebor, scoured of all but the memory of the dragon's occupation, they were joyfully reunited with old Nan, the Blacklock dwarf, who had been to them friend, nurse and grandmother for more than twenty years of their childhood. It had been sixty years since they had seen the old dwarf-woman.

Gimli left his new friends with their old friend and went back to his family. Whether he ever heard the end of their tale is not known, but the full history of Ferin and Fala's adventures was recorded and preserved in the libraries of the Orocarni upon the far eastern shore of Middle-earth. It is included here at the request of their children; though, for reasons of their own, the Dwarves of Durin's line do not consider it a part of their own history.

.~O~.

Betta stayed upon the hillside all that day until cold evening when Tom, returning to the farm after spending his free day with friends in Town, found her still kneeling, her clothes soaked with dew and tears. He could not move her nor rouse her to move herself. He brought her a blanket, food that she would not eat and water that she would not drink, and waited with her until Gilon and Nan returned from the mountains. It was night before Gilon arrived to lift her up and carry her down from the hill. She spoke not a word and was asleep as soon as they laid her in bed.

She slept for three days and refused to leave her room for longer, until Frei herself came down from the Dwarfhome and spoke to her with the door closed. If Nan knew what had been said between them, she told no one else, but afterwards, Betta returned to her work, quiet and sickly, and with her eyes always turned east. The only pleasure she took was in learning her new bow. She ate when ordered and maintained her own self with less care than she maintained her knife and new walking boots.

Because she was obstinate and sick for the first three months after her husband left, not even Nan realized what was changed in her; she thought Betta suffered only from grief and loneliness. It was enough, and a better midwife than Nan could have been forgiven for not guessing the truth. Betta was four months along in her pregnancy before either of them suspected the extent of her future misery.

On the last day of November, 2941, Betta was sick in bed when Frei came down from the mountain bearing news from the east. A single Raven, nearly dead from exhaustion, had flown all the long leagues between Ered Luin and Erebor, bringing word that the Dragon was dead. The Raven told that there had been a great war upon the foot of the Mountain, and that all of Thorin's company lay slain upon the battlefield.

Frei was distraught. Her belly still swelled with her husband's child, and she grieved that Dwalin should never hold the babe, but Betta who was the weaker of the two only shook her head. "I will not heed the news of the carrion eater," she said. "Your Raven says that they are _all_ dead, but we know that cannot be true, for your husband is a warrior and will not die. My husband is a prince and cannot die. Tell me when a Dwarf brings news of them. I will not listen to birds."

Her words were spoken with little kindness or caution, but Frei found comfort in them and left Nan's house with her hopes rekindled. But Betta, who had given hope, was destined to have only misery. Within the week, a second bird arrived at Ered Luin; it did not speak but bore a message tied to its leg for Frei. The words were written in the hand of Balin, son of Fundin, upon a scrap of leather: Dwalin was alive, Thorin Oakenshield had fallen, and with him fell his two nephews both. They were dead.

Once more, Frei descended to Gilon's cabin and brought with her the message for Betta to see with her own eyes. Betta said nothing after she had read the note, and turned her face away. That night, she fell into fever, and three days later, was delivered of twins, a son and a daughter, both with plentiful hair on their chins.

Nan kept the secrets of Betta's birthing bed to herself and would only say that it was difficult. The children had come earlier than expected. Betta's health, which had been weak since Fili's departure, was broken, and she lay near death for many days, unable to hold the infants in her arms. Even after her fever broke, she would not touch them, and if ever a little dwarfling cried out in hunger, it was Nan who held the child to its mother's breast to feed.

On the first of January, 2942, the Dwarves of Ered Luin began to pack. The mountain was reclaimed. Dain was crowned King, and soon many would return to the home of their fathers. Frei had been safely delivered of a son, and though she sent many fine words and a few strands of infant hair along to his father, and though the mountains were far safer than they had been for many years, she would not risk the dwarfling on such a long journey. She was still settled at Ered Luin in June of 2944 when Betta disappeared for the first time.

In the middle of the night, Nan woke to the sound of Ferin's tears. She had gone to check on the child and found Betta's bed empty, her cloak and boots missing, and her crossbow gone from its hook in the wall. She had waited two years, until the infants were weaned before she walked out into the wild.

Betta was gone for six months, returning before the first snow of winter, but it was not the last time that she would set out on her own.

It was at this point in Nan's storytelling that Ferin began to place his own memories into the tale. It was Nan who had raised him while Betta was away. It was nan who had spread ointment on his scraped knees and filled his head with tales of Dwarven history. 'Mama' had been little more than a shadow and a rumor in his life for many years. She was often away, visiting far places, and returning without warning every winter with strange, foreign gifts that delighted Fala and confused Ferin. When 'mama' was at home, she was often sad and quick to anger, but Nan made sure that they loved and remembered her. For all that she neglected them in their formative years, she did love them and, forever after, she would have the fierce loyalty of her children. She was their mother, and they had the blood of their father's people in them.

.~O~.

In the year 2949, Balin, son of Fundin, returned into the west with the wizard Gandalf. They visited first in The Shire where they had a friend dwelling, but afterwards, Balin rode farther west to the Ered Luin. He had come to bring Frei and her child, Farin, back with him to Erebor, and to fulfill a promise that he had made to Fili on the eve of the Battle of Five Armies.

Ferin and Fala had been eight years old when Balin visited the farm, but they carried the memory of his visit all their lives. He had seemed to be the oldest dwarf in the world to them, with his long, white beard and they laughed at how loudly he groaned as he sat down in the chair that Nan offered him. Balin brought with him many tales of their father to delight and sadden them. Betta, who was home at the time, did not stop him from telling the true tale of their father's final battle. Only her eyes showed how little value she placed in the honor that Balin claimed his death had won their family.

Before he left, Balin presented Betta with much gold from the treasury of Erebor, and several fine jewels. At first she refused the gift, but Balin told her that it had been Fili's wish for her to be looked after, and several of the jewels in particular had been selected by Fili's own hand for her to wear. These, Betta accepted readily, but the gold was put aside for Ferin and Fala to grow into.

Balin stayed a month at Ered Luin. A caravan of dwarves went with him when he left, and Betta's final parting with Frei was tender and sad, with much respect given on both sides.

.~O~.

Very little of any historic value occurred over the next twenty years. In Erebor, under Dain, the Dwarves prospered and the people of Dale rebuilt their city, making many pacts of friendship between the mountain, the water and the woods. In the west, with few Dwarves left in the Blue Mountains to compete with him, Gilon grew his business and prospered in his own way, teaching his apprentice Tom and eventually passing on management of the forge to him. Tom married a fine, sturdy milkmaid named Rosemary, and they had two children of their own who grew up in awe of their half-dwarf cousins an with just the right amount of fear and love for their Aunt Nan. Betta left the farm less and less as she grew older, and her eyes began to turn more often south than east.

It was near the end of this time, at the respectable age of seventy-six years old, that Gilon died and Nan buried him in the high hills overlooking his family's land. The next spring, she joined a merchant's caravan and rode east to rejoin her lady, Frei. Nan left the farm to Betta, but Betta was no longer content to live on borrowed land. The salty sea air had called to her and she longed to see again the green hills and blue rivers of Lebennin. Her failing health also recommended the warm air of the southern coasts to her, and Ferin – who was by now a hearty dwarf-lad of twenty-seven years – had inherited his mother's wanderlust.

The farm, the forge, and Betta's bee fields, were passed on to Tom and Rosemary. It was a tearful parting between old friends and childhood playmates, but eventually Ferin drove the wagon that carried his mother and sister south to the Elf Havens, across the Lhun, and through the empty hills of Minhiriath and the Enedwaith. They returned to Lebenin and found, much to their surprise, several of their mother's cousins still residing in that land under the stewardship Ecthelion II, father of Denethor who, according to rumor, was soon to wed Finduilas of Dol Amroth.

Ferin set up a smithy of his own and made good money there, but it was Fala's needlework that kept them in sweet bread and good beer. A single handkerchief of her simplest work was sought after by all the fine ladies of Gondor, and Betta's midwifery earned them respect. More than once, with her one hand, she was the difference between life and death for some small babe or suffering woman, and what she knew, she taught her daughter until her death in the year 2996.

She was eighty-two years old.

.~O~.

Soon after the death of their mother, Ferin and Fala moved north and built a fine stone house at the feet of Ered Nimrais. There were several small villages near them and many folk who were glad to hire a blacksmith with almost dwarf-like skill in metalwork, and who were willing to overlook Fala's unfortunate beard if it meant that more of their women and infants would survive the dangers of childbirth. Still, Fala rarely went abroad as her brother did. She was too proud to shave her beard but too ashamed of the looks that Men gave her when she went out. She took to wearing a veil over her face in the fashion of the Easterling women and removed it only when at home or among friends.

These were dark days for the land of Gondor. War was brewing in the east and in the year 3019, it broke out in force. Ferin had volunteered for the homeguard of Lossarnach and when the call came, he joined the soldiery that marched east to Gondor under the banner of Forlong the Fat, and many of the men that day carried battleaxes forged in Ferin's own fire.

The son of Fili, Dis's son, earned his scars upon the field of Pelannor and in the streets of Minas Tirith, but when he wished to march to Mordor and do battle there as well, his wounds prevented him. He remained in the city with the men left to guard and assisted in rebuilding the broken walls. At home in Lossarnach, Fala was doing her part. she had taken charge of the many women, children and old folk who were left behind. There might have been more hunger and fear in those hills if not for her careful eye and firm hand; when the men returned, there was meat in the larder and the fields were ready for sowing.

.~O~.

After the War, Ferin and Fala travelled north again, this time with Gimli to visit the halls of their father's fathers. They expected little welcome there, but Gimli spoke for them, and though Frei had died young before the war, Dwalin remembered their mother as having been a friend of his wife. Fili's children were recognized by Thorin III Stonehelm as the friends of his cousins and were shown to the tombs of their father and uncle. Fala wore her mother's pendant and was proud to find that the painted miniature inside was a faithful copy of the face carved on her father's final bed.

The siblings spent several years in Erebor and in Dale. They were the comfort of Nan in her old age and much loved by Farin, Frei's son, but there was much more work to be done in the North after the fall of Mordor and the last great war. Many foul creatures had fled the Battle of Dale and taken refuge in the Grey Mountains north or Erebor. Ferin fought there with the soldiers of the Lonely Mountain while Fala went with them to bandage the wounded and bathe the dead.

Before her death in 3021, Nan told Fala of the eastern mountains and the grim fate of the Orocarni dwarves. All their lives, the twins had been inseparable. War was all that had divided them, and so, when Fala decided to go east, her brother went with her.

Many adventures they had in Rhun and in the unmapped lands beyond where they fought the Necromancer, Guizgidur, and helped to free the slave peoples of Pallandomar. After three years of wandering the eastern steppe lands, they reached the Red Mountains and met the remnant folk of the Ironfists and Stiffbeards who gave the siblings safe passage south to the city of the Blacklock Dwarves. There, some of the old folk still remembered Frei and Nan, and were glad to have news of their long-thought-lost kinswomen.

Ferin and Fala both were nearly ninety years old at this time and had neither the short years of their mother's people, nor the long life of their father's folk. They settled down. Ferin married a Blacklock dwarf-woman and had two daughters by her that were considered a blessing on their clan as there were few dwarf-women in the east at that time. The Blacklocks had dwindled so far that they had only a few qualms accepting mixed-race folk into their House, reasoning that the human half of him would be washed out in a few short generations. Fala was still a practicing midwife and according to the custom of the Blacklock Dwarves at that time, she remained unmarried but had a son by her close friend, Norn, who they named Fili and who would later go on to lead an embassy of Eastern Dwarves to Erebor. There, they would reunite the four long-sundered Dwarf Houses with their western kin and swear oaths of lasting friendship and mutual aid. It is said that Frei's son, Farin, himself travelled east in his father's name to recognize the Orocarni Kingdoms before he died.

Although the Dwarves of Durin in the west were reluctant to recognize Ferin and Fala as their kin, among the Blacklocks of the Orocarni, songs were sung of the brother and sister's adventures, and of their parents' love. In much the same way that the Tall Folk sang the story of Aragorn and Arwen, the Blacklock Dwarves sang of Betta and Fili, of their sorrows in life and their love beyond death, and some will say that far beyond the edge of the world, in the great, stone halls of Mahal, the two lovers were reunited, and in the red light of the smithy fire, they sit together still, telling their tales each to the other until the ending - or the mending - the world.

**The End… of this tale.**

* * *

**It's hard to believe that after three years, Betta and Fili's story is finally ended. And yes, it really has this time. I had intended to write Ferin and Fala's history, too, but at some point it began to cross the line between fanfiction and original fiction - they are both OCs and eastern Middle-earth doesn't really have enough Canon characters to keep it going on its own - so I filled out my notes and included them here for anyone who wanted to know how it ends.**

**Thank you all, everyone who has read this story, and double thanks to those who reviewed and stuck with me all this time. It was an honor to write for you.**

**Now for shameless self-advertising:**

**I'll be moving on to a new fandom for awhile, working on a series of Doctor Who adventures. Have pity on a poor author and go take a look. The Evolution of Carmen Ortiz is going strong and eager for new readers. In its first episode, a scream echoes through the Tardis control room, but nothing can get past the shields. Or can it? The 9th Doctor and Rose are drawn back to earth to investigate an impossible sound. Government experiments are threatening the very fabric of space and time, and a young woman is trapped in a deadly energy field. It's all just another day in the life of the Last Time Lord.**

**Thank you. Thank you. Fare you well, and thank you.**

**-Paint**


End file.
